Eastern Asia, bordering the East China Sea, Korea Bay,
Yellow Sea, and South China Sea, between North Korea and Vietnam

35 00 N, 105 00 E

Asia

total: 9,596,960 sq km
land: 9,326,410 sq km
water: 270,550 sq km

slightly smaller than the US

total: 22,143.34 km
border countries: Afghanistan 76 km, Bhutan 470 km, Burma 2,185 km,
Hong Kong 30 km, India 3,380 km, Kazakhstan 1,533 km, North Korea
1,416 km, Kyrgyzstan 858 km, Laos 423 km, Macau 0.34 km, Mongolia
4,673 km, Nepal 1,236 km, Pakistan 523 km, Russia (northeast) 3,605
km, Russia (northwest) 40 km, Tajikistan 414 km, Vietnam 1,281 km

14,500 km

contiguous zone: 24 nm
continental shelf: 200 nm or to the edge of the continental margin
territorial sea: 12 nm

extremely diverse; tropical in south to subarctic in north

mostly mountains, high plateaus, deserts in west; plains,
deltas, and hills in east

lowest point: Turpan Pendi -154 m
highest point: Mount Everest 8,850 m (1999 est.)

coal, iron ore, petroleum, natural gas, mercury,
tin, tungsten, antimony, manganese, molybdenum, vanadium, magnetite,
aluminum, lead, zinc, uranium, hydropower potential (world's largest)

arable land: 10%
permanent crops: 0%
permanent pastures: 43%
forests and woodland: 14%
other: 33% (1993 est.)

498,720 sq km (1993 est.)

frequent typhoons (about five per year along southern
and eastern coasts); damaging floods; tsunamis; earthquakes; droughts

air pollution (greenhouse gases, sulfur
dioxide particulates) from reliance on coal, produces acid rain; water
shortages, particularly in the north; water pollution from untreated
wastes; deforestation; estimated loss of one-fifth of agricultural
land since 1949 to soil erosion and economic development;
desertification; trade in endangered species

party to: Antarctic-Environmental Protocol, Antarctic Treaty,
Biodiversity, Climate Change, Desertification, Endangered Species,
Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping, Ozone Layer
Protection, Ship Pollution, Tropical Timber 83, Tropical Timber 94,
Wetlands, Whaling
signed, but not ratified: Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Nuclear Test
Ban

world's fourth-largest country (after Russia,
Canada, and US)