Head of state: Queen Elizabeth II, represented by a governor-general Prime minister: Danny Philip
President: Jurelang Zedkaia
Population
584,578
68,480
Life Expectancy
74.420 years
72.030 years
Capital City
Largest city
Honiara (population: 56,298)
Majuro (population: 20,500)
Human Development Index
0.591
0
GDP per capita
Literacy Rate
%
93.7%
Corruption Perception Index
2.9
NA
Percentage of Women in Parliament
0%
3%
Wealthiest Citizens
Unemployment Rate
Death Penalty
Abolished
Abolished
Political System
parliamentary democracy
constitutional government in free association with the US; the Compact of Free Association entered into force 21 October 1986 and the Amended Compact entered into force in May 2004
Independence date
Religions
Church of Melanesia 32.8%, Roman Catholic 19%, South Seas Evangelical 17%, Seventh-Day Adventist 11.2%, United Church 10.3%, Christian Fellowship Church 2.4%, other Christian 4.4%, other 2.4%, unspecified 0.3%, none 0.2% (1999 census)
Protestant 54.8%, Assembly of God 25.8%, Roman Catholic 8.4%, Bukot nan Jesus 2.8%, Mormon 2.1%, other Christian 3.6%, other 1%, none 1.5% (1999 census)
Languages
Melanesian pidgin in much of the country is lingua franca; English (official; but spoken by only 1%-2% of the population); 120 indigenous languages
Marshallese (official) 98.2%, other languages 1.8% (1999 census) note: English (official), widely spoken as a second language
Exports
External Debt
Exchange Rate
Military Budget as percentage of GDP
Beijing Olympics Medal Count
Location
Oceania, group of islands in the South Pacific Ocean, east of Papua New Guinea
Oceania, two archipelagic island chains of 29 atolls, each made up of many small islets, and five single islands in the North Pacific Ocean, about half way between Hawaii and Australia
Area
28,896 km sq
181 km sq
Coastline
5,313 km
370 km
Climate
tropical monsoon; few extremes of temperature and weather
tropical; hot and humid; wet season May to November; islands border typhoon belt
