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@Germany

Germany Introduction

Background: As Western Europe's richest and most populous nation,
Germany remains a key member of the continent's economic, political,
and defense organizations. European power struggles immersed the
country in two devastating World Wars in the first half of the 20th
century and left the country occupied by the victorious Allied
powers of the US, UK, France, and the Soviet Union in 1945. With the
advent of the Cold War, two German states were formed in 1949: the
western Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) and the eastern German
Democratic Republic (GDR). The democratic FRG embedded itself in key
Western economic and security organizations, the EC and NATO, while
the communist GDR was on the front line of the Soviet-led Warsaw
Pact. The decline of the USSR and the end of the Cold War allowed
for German unification in 1990. Since then Germany has expended
considerable funds to bring eastern productivity and wages up to
western standards. In January 1999, Germany and 10 other EU
countries formed a common European currency, the euro.

Germany Geography

Location: Central Europe, bordering the Baltic Sea and the North
Sea, between the Netherlands and Poland, south of Denmark

Geographic coordinates: 51 00 N, 9 00 E

Map references: Europe

Area: total: 357,021 sq km

land: 349,223 sq km

water: 7,798 sq km

Area - comparative: slightly smaller than Montana

Land boundaries: total: 3,618 km

border countries: Austria 784 km, Belgium 167 km, Czech Republic
646 km, Denmark 68 km, France 451 km, Luxembourg 135 km, Netherlands
577 km, Poland 456 km, Switzerland 334 km

Coastline: 2,389 km

Maritime claims: continental shelf: 200-m depth or to the depth of
exploitation

exclusive economic zone: 200 NM

territorial sea: 12 NM

Climate: temperate and marine; cool, cloudy, wet winters and
summers; occasional warm foehn wind

Terrain: lowlands in north, uplands in center, Bavarian Alps in south

Elevation extremes: lowest point: Freepsum Lake -2 m

highest point: Zugspitze 2,963 m

Natural resources: iron ore, coal, potash, timber, lignite, uranium,
copper, natural gas, salt, nickel, arable land

Land use: arable land: 33%

permanent crops: 1%

permanent pastures: 15%

forests and woodland: 31%

other: 20% (1993 est.)

Irrigated land: 4,750 sq km (1993 est.)

Natural hazards: flooding

Environment - cu