General Information about Belarus

State system. Belarus is a unitary, democratic, social, law-governed state. State power in the Republic of Belarus is exercised by its division into legislative, executive and judicial branches. President of the Republic of Belarus is the Head of State. Executive power in the Republic of Belarus is exercised by the Government, i.e. the Council of Ministers headed by the Prime Minister. The supreme representative and legislative body is the National Assembly composed of two houses: the House of Representatives and the Council of the Republic. All citizens exercise local government and self-government through local Councils of Deputies, executive and administrative authorities, bodies of territorial and civil self-government, local referendums, meetings and other forms of direct participation in state and public affairs.

The official languages are Belarusian and Russian.

Geographical position. Belarus occupies an advantageous economic, geographic and geopolitical position in Eastern Europe at the crossroads of major railways and motor roads, oil, gas and product pipelines and systems of communication between Western Europe, regions of Russia and Asian countries. The territory of Belarus is crossed by one of the major Eurasian ways, including the shortest communication ways from the Central and Eastern regions of Russia to countries of Western Europe, as well as between the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea. In the west Belarus borders on Poland, in the northwest on Lithuania, in the north on Latvia, in the northeast and east on Russia, and in the south on Ukraine. The distance between the capital of the country, the City of Minsk, and capitals of other states is: 184 km to Vilnius, 468 km to Riga, 558 km to Warsaw, 545 km to Kiev, 706 km to Moscow, and 1060 km to Berlin.

The area of the country is 207,600 sq. km. The longest distance from west to east is 650 km, from north to south 560 km. The terrain of Belarus is predominantly plain with hills: the average elevation is 160 m above the sea level; the highest elevation is 345 m.

Administrative division. The Republic of Belarus is divided territorially into six Oblasts (regions) with their administrative centres in Minsk, Brest, Vitebsk, Gomel, Grodno and Mogilev. The country includes 118 administrative districts (rayons). The Republic of Belarus includes 110 towns, of which 15 towns have population over 100,000, and 103 urbanised populated localities.

Population of Belarus is 9.799 million people. Over 70 percent are urban population. Beside Belarusians (81.2 percent), the population includes Russians (11.4 percent), Poles (3.9 percent), Ukrainians (2.4 percent) and other nationalities (1.1 percent). The population density is 47 persons per square kilometre. The largest city in the country is its capital, the City of Minsk, with 1.726 million people at the beginning of 2003.

Climate is temperate continental, with soft and humid winter and warm summer. The average January temperature is from -1.9 °C in the southwest to -3 C° in the northeast of the country; the average July temperature is +21…+23 °C. The annual fallout is 550-650 mm in low places and 650-750 mm in plain and hilly parts.

Agricultural land occupies 43.9 percent of the country’s area, including 26.5 percent of arable land. Belarus has 0.9 ha of agricultural land per capita, including over 0.6 ha of arable land.

Forests occupy 37.8 percent of the country’s area. The country has 0.94 ha of wooded land per capita and 136.1 cu. m of timber reserves per capita, which is almost 2-fold higher than the average European figure. Belarus has mainly valuable wood trees: pine occupies 50.2 percent, spruce 10 percent, oak and other hard-leaved trees 3.3 percent, birch 20.8 percent, aspen 2.1 percent, and alder 10.5 percent of the wooded area. The annual increase of timber reserves reaches 25 million cu. m; the actual amount of wood harvest is within 10-11 million cu. m. Belarusian forests are not only sources of timber, but also play an important biospheric role: they contribute significantly to stability of the environment of Eastern and Central Europe.

Water resources. Belarus has over 20 thousand rivers and streams with the total length of about 91,000 km; about 11 thousand lakes; and 145 artificial water reservoirs. The largest water reservoir is the Naroch Lake (80 sq. km). The available natural water resources are quite sufficient to meet both current and future needs for water.

Mineral resources. In Belarus, about 30 types of mineral resources have been found (over 4,000 mineral fields and deposits). Of special significance among them are potassium salts: by their industrial reserves the country is among the leading countries in Europe. Prospected industrial reserves of the Mozyr, David-Gorodok and Starobin deposits exceed 22 billion tons. The Republic is rich in non-ore minerals like granite, dolomite, marl and chalk, low-melting and high-melting clay, loams, sand and gravel materials, raw material for manufacture of natural paints (boggy iron ore, ochre, glauconite, etc.) and possesses a rather powerful raw material base for manufacture of construction materials. Peat reserves are widely spread in Belarus. The total geological reserves are estimated at 4.4 billion tons. At present, the extracted natural reserves constitute 600 million tons. Another important natural resource is sapropel whose reserves are estimated at 3 billion cu. m. Oil reserves are not big; its production covers only 12-13 percent of the country needs, and this ratio will not change in the future.

Labour resources. The number of employees at enterprises and organisations is 4.34 million people; of them, 1.14 million persons are employed in industries, and 0.51 million people in agriculture. The country has a modern system of professional training, which guarantees a high educational level of population and high skills of employees, including such sectors as automotive, tractor and agricultural machinery building, optical sector, radio and electronics, precision instruments, etc.