Flags of the World
Gallery of Covers
Text/Low Bandwidth Version

Download This Publication
Submit a Factual Update
Search The World Factbook

What's New
- Country information has been updated as of 18 January 2007.
- There have been some significant changes to the latest edition of The World Factbook . The successful secession referendum held in Montenegro in May of 2006 allowed it to legally leave its union with Serbia the following month. These two Balkan countries have now been formally recognized and are listed separately in the Factbook.
- In the Government category, the ‘Capital’ entry has been greatly expanded and now contains up to four subfields, including significant new information having to do with time. The subfields consist of the name of the capital itself, its geographic coordinates, the time difference at the capital from coordinated universal time (UTC), and, if applicable, information on daylight saving time (DST). Where appropriate, a special note has been added to highlight those countries that have multiple time zones.
- The Transnational issues category now has a rafficking in persons?entry. Human trafficking connotes modern-day slavery and this important new field will include information on the most egregious countries (Tier 2 Watch List and Tier 3) as listed in the US State Department's annual report.
- A new Appendix G lists Weights and Measures . The appendix includes information on mathematical notation and metric interrelationships, as well as over 400 examples of standard conversion factors.
-Revision of some individual country maps, first introduced in the 2001 edition, is continued in this edition. Several regional maps have also been updated to reflect boundary changes and place name spelling changes.

Homepage

The online Factbook is updated periodically throughout the year.
ISSN 1553-8133

For additional and more current information on
leadership in selected foreign countries, see Chiefs of State.