ACOG - Ireland  - IBM

Geography

Location: Western Europe, occupying five-sixths of the island of Ireland in the North Atlantic Ocean, west of Great Britain

Area:
total area: 70,280 sq km
land area: 68,890 sq km
comparative area: slightly larger than West Virginia

Land boundaries: total 360 km, UK 360 km

Coastline: 1,448 km


People

Population: 3,550,448 (July 1995 est.)

Age structure:
0-14 years: 24% (female 415,640; male 440,468)
15-64 years: 64% (female 1,125,638; male 1,155,823)
65 years and over: 12% (female 237,098; male 175,781)

Population growth rate: 0.33% (1995 est.)

Birth rate: 14.04 births/1,000 population

Death rate: 8.48 deaths/1,000 population

Net migration rate: -2.22 migrant(s)/1,000 population

Infant mortality rate: 7.2 deaths/1,000 live births

Life expectancy at birth:
total population: 75.99 years
male: 73.15 years
female: 79 years

Total fertility rate: 1.95 children born/woman

Ethnic divisions: Celtic, English

Religions: Roman Catholic 93%, Anglican 3%, none 1%, unknown 2%, other 1% (1981)

Languages: Irish (Gaelic), spoken mainly in areas located along the western seaboard, English is the language generally used

Literacy: age 15 and over can read and write (1981 est.)
total population: 98%
male:
female:


Government

Names:
conventional long form: none
conventional short form: Ireland

Type: republic

Capital: Dublin

Independence: 6 December 1921 (from UK)

Constitution: 29 December 1937; adopted 1 July 1937 by plebescite


Economy

National product: GDP - purchasing power parity - $49.8 billion

National product real growth rate: 5.5%

National product per capita: $14,060

Inflation rate (consumer prices): 2.7%

Unemployment rate: 16%

Electricity:
capacity: 3,930,000 kW
production: 14.9 billion kWh
consumption per capita: 3,938 kWh



Olympic Factoid
More tickets were sold to the competitions of the 1996 Games than to any other Olympic Games or sports event in history. The 8.6 million ticket sales figures topped sales to the Los Angeles and Barcelona Games combined.