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Europe
Poland |
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Last reviewed: 20 July 2009 |
Country information
GEOGRAPHY
Covering an area of 312,685 sq km, Poland is the largest country in central Europe. It is bordered by Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, and to the north the Baltic Sea. Poland is a mainly flat country: most lies at an altitude of less than 200 metres above sea level. However, the high Tatra and Carpathian mountain ranges in the south rise to a peak of 2,499 metres at Rysy on the Slovakian border. The fertile country – 47% of which is arable land – is traversed by large and slow moving rivers such as the Vistula and the Bug.
Poland has a temperate climate with seasonal variations between -15C in winter and 35C in the summer. Extremes of temperature are more pronounced in the mountains of the south and in the lake area in the north.
The population of Poland is approximately 38.6m. The capital Warsaw (population 1,706,624) is the financial and commercial centre. Other major cities in Poland are Krakow (756,336), Lodz (753,192), Wroclaw (635,280), Poznan (567,882) Gdansk, Bialystok, Poznan and Katowice (population data from 2007).
Natural resources include coal, sulphur, copper, natural gas, silver, amber, lead, salt and arable land.
