Nicaragua
Nicaragua is located in the geographic heart of Central America and is the region's largest country at 128,410 square kilometers (49,579 square miles), which makes it slightly larger than Iowa. With 5.3 million inhabitants (2002) and abundant arable land, Nicaragua theoretically faces less population pressure than its neighbors. The country displays a striking topography that includes a vast tropical lowland to the east, a central mountain range that runs across the country northwest to southeast, stunning volcanoes, and two of the region's largest natural lakes. The presence of significant volcanic activity has endowed Nicaragua with rich agricultural lands and the potential for abundant geothermal energy. Nicaragua's climate is influenced by altitude, with high temperatures in the lowlands and coastal areas and moderate temperatures at higher elevations. The extraordinary Lake Nicaragua, which empties into the Río San Juan on the southern border with Costa Rica, provides Nicaragua with the potential to construct a trans-isthmus waterway between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
Approximately 70 percent of Nicaraguans are mestizo (of mixed European and Indian ancestry), less than 20 percent are white, and the rest are black or indigenous. These last ethnic groups have long been relatively isolated from the rest of Nicaragua by geography.
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