BASIC
INFORMATION
Full
Name: MEXICO
Capital
Mexico City
Largest city Mexico
City
Official language
None at federal level
Spanish (de facto)
Government
Federal Republic
Area 1,972,550
km²
Population
107,029,000
Currency Peso (MXN)
Time
zone (UTC-8 to -6)
Internet
TLD .mx
Calling
code +52
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GEOGRAPHY
& BACKGROUND
The
United Mexican States (Spanish: Estados
Unidos Mexicanos), generally known as Mexico
(Spanish: México) is a country located
in North America, bordered at the north
by the United States, and at the south by
Guatemala and Belize, in Central America.
It is the northernmost and westernmost country
in Latin America, and also the most populous
Spanish-speaking country in the world.
The
official name is Estados Unidos Mexicanos,
which translates as the United Mexican States.
The term State of Mexico (Estado de México)
does not refer to the country, but only
to one state within Mexico, located near
the center of the country adjacent to the
Federal District.
The
site of advanced Amerindian civilizations,
the land that currently makes up Mexico
existed under Spanish rule for three centuries
before achieving independence early in the
19th century. A devaluation of the peso
in late 1994 threw Mexico into economic
turmoil, triggering the worst recession
in over half a century. The nation continues
to make an impressive recovery. Ongoing
economic and social concerns include low
real wages, underemployment for a large
segment of the population, inequitable income
distribution, and few advancement opportunities
for the largely Amerindian population in
the impoverished southern states. Elections
held in July 2000 marked the first time
since the 1910 Mexican Revolution that the
opposition defeated the party in government,
the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI)
and Vicente Fox of the National Action Party
(PAN) was sworn in as President on 1 December
2000.
Mexico
is a powerful and influential neighbor of
the United States, in terms of trade, culture,
diplomacy, and a history of emigration of
Mexicans into the U.S. since the early 1900's.
Mexico
borders the United States to the north,
the Pacific Ocean to the west and southwest,
the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico
to the east, and Belize and Guatemala to
the southeast.
Mexico
is geographically part of North America
and is the most populous Hispanic nation
in the world. With the southwestern United
States (specifically, California, Arizona,
New Mexico, and Texas), Mexico sits at the
top of the cultural region called "Latin
America".
The
United Nations classifies Mexico as part
of Central America, (see UN geoscheme).
The European Union and Mexico itself do
not.
The
main of Mexico is certainly in the region
called "Mesoamerica," but the
southeasternmost portion of Mexico (including
the Yucatan Peninsula) is physically within
the Central American region, while northern
Mexico is part of the same broad geographic
region as the American states of Texas,
New Mexico, and Arizona; and northwestern
Mexico is constituted of the Baja or California
Peninsula.
As
well as numerous neighbouring islands, Mexican
territory includes the more remote Isla
Guadalupe and the Islas Revillagigedo in
the Pacific Ocean. Mexico's total area covers
1,972,550 square kilometers, including approximately
6,000 square kilometers of islands in the
Pacific Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean
Sea, and Gulf of California (see fig. 3).
On its north, Mexico shares a 3,326-kilometer
border with the United States. The meandering
Río Bravo del Norte (known as the
Rio Grande in the United States) defines
the border from Ciudad Juárez east
to the Gulf of Mexico. A series of natural
and artificial markers delineate the United
States-Mexican border west from Ciudad Juárez
to the Pacific Ocean. On its south, Mexico
shares an 871 kilometer border with Guatemala
and a 251-kilometer border with Belize.
Mexico
has a 10,143 kilometer coastline, of which
7,338 kilometers face the Pacific Ocean
and the Gulf of California, and the remaining
2,805 kilometers front the Gulf of Mexico
and the Caribbean Sea. Mexico's exclusive
economic zone (EEZ), which extends 200 nautical
miles (370 km) off each coast, covers approximately
2.7 million square kilometers. The landmass
of Mexico dramatically narrows as it moves
in a southeasterly direction from the United
States border and then abruptly curves northward
before ending in the 500-kilometer-long
Yucatán Peninsula. Indeed, the capital
of Yucatán State, Mérida,
is farther north than Mexico City or Guadalajara.
