|República de Panamá
Republic of Panama
|Motto: "Pro Mundi Beneficio" (Latin)
"For the Benefit of the World"
|Anthem: Himno Nacional de Panamá (Spanish)
National anthem of Panama
(and largest city)
|-||Vice President||Juan Carlos Varela|
|-||from Spain||28 November 1821|
|-||from Colombia||3 November 1903|
|-||Total||75,517 km² (118th)
29,157 sq mi
|-||May 2010 census||3,405,813|
|GDP (PPP)||2010 estimate|
|GDP (nominal)||2010 estimate|
|Gini (2009)||▼52 (high)|
|Currency||Balboa, U.S. dollar (
Panama, officially the Republic of Panama (Spanish: República de Panamá), is the southernmost country of Central America. Situated on an isthmus, Panama is a transcontinental nation which connects North and South America. It borders Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. Panama was the home to the first Spanish colony on the Pacific Ocean and served as a crucial staging point between various nations since that time. Best known today as the home of the Panama Canal, it remains one of the most strategic transportation hubs in the world. International affairs and world commerce are highly dependent upon the Canal.
The culture, customs, and language of Panamanians are predominantly Caribbean and Spanish. Ethnically, the majority of the population is mestizo of mixed Amerindian and European descent. Its vibrant music and culture draw tourists from around the world. However, political and social turmoil plagued the nation throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, inhibiting its growth and advancement.
Spanish is the official and dominant language; English is spoken widely on the Caribbean coast and by many in business and professional fields. More than half the population lives in the Panama City–Colón metropolitan corridor. Panama is an international business center and also a transit country. Although it is the third largest economy in Central America, after Guatemala and Costa Rica, it is the largest consumer in Central America.
Panama is a country located in Central America, bordering both the Caribbean Sea and the North Pacific Ocean, between Colombia and Costa Rica. Panama is located on the narrowest and lowest part of the Isthmus of Panama that links North America and South America. This S-shaped part of the isthmus is situated between 7° and 10° north latitude and 77° and 83° west longitude. Panama encompasses approximately 78,200 square kilometers, is 772 kilometers in length, and between 60 and 177 kilometers in width.
Panama's two coastlines are referred to as the Caribbean (or Atlantic) and Pacific, rather than the north and south coasts. Because of the location and contour of the country, directions expressed in terms of the compass are often misleading. For example, a transit of the Panama Canal from the Pacific to the Caribbean involves travel not to the east but to the northwest, and in Panama City the sunrise in the east is over the Pacific. From Cerro Jefe, near Panama City, it is possible to see both the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean from the same location.
The Caribbean coastline is marked by several good natural harbors. However, Cristóbal, at the Caribbean terminus of the canal, had the only important port facilities in the late 1980s. The numerous islands of the Archipiélago de Bocas del Toro, near the Beaches of Costa Rica, provide an extensive natural roadstead and shield the banana port of Almirante. The over 350 San Blas Islands, near Colombia, which are strung for more than 160 kilometers along the sheltered Caribbean coastline, also belong to Panama.
The major port on the Pacific coastline is Balboa. The principal islands are those of the Archipiélago de las Perlas in the middle of the Gulf of Panama, the penal colony on the Isla de Coiba in the Golfo de Chiriquí, and the decorative island of Taboga, a tourist attraction that can be seen from Panama City. In all, there are some 1,000 islands off the Pacific coast.
The Pacific coastal waters are extraordinarily shallow. Depths of 180 meters are reached only outside the 