FINLAND FACTS

FINLAND FACTS

Summary:

1.  Introduction.
2.  Borders.
3.  Relief.
4.  Hydrography.
5.  Climate.
6.  Independence.

1) INTRODUCTION:

Finland Facts are quite unique around the globe. Finland is a northern European country, almost one-third of which is located north of the Arctic Circle, a member of the European Union. In Finnish(local language), the country is named Suomi and Swedish Finland.

Capital: Helsinki.
Population (2018): 5.54 million inhabitants.
Gross Domestic Product - GDP (2018): $ 242.503 billion.
Official languages: Finnish and Swedish.
Area: 338 145 km^2.
Currency: Euro.

2) MAP AND FLAG:

Finland Map

Finland Flag

3) BORDERS:

Located on the Baltic coast, Finland is the northernmost country in the European Union. It has on the east a long border with Russia, in the north with Norway and Sweden. Its coasts on the Gulf of Bothnia face Sweden, while its coasts on the Gulf of Finland look towards Estonia. Tallinn, Helsinki and Stockholm constitute a dynamic triangle of capitals of Member States on the Baltic.

The fifth largest country in Europe (340,000 km2), Finland has a low population density. It has only 5, 2 million inhabitants, as much as Denmark. The population is very much focused on the southern seaboard. The country has two official languages: Finnish (spoken by more than 90% of the population) and Swedish.

Finland Facts is 70% forested and has a hilly landscape with a vast lake complex of more than 60,000 lakes, hence the nickname of a country with a thousand lakes. Due to its size and high latitude, the country has a very variable climate. The seasons are very marked. In the north, winter is cold and snowy, but the snowpack does not persist long in the southern or coastal part of the country. Summer is usually sunny and mild thanks to the Gulf Stream.. In the south-west of the country, in the Baltic Sea, the archipelago of Ahvenanmaa (Åland Islands) comprises 6,500 islands.

4) RELIEF:

Scandinavian Shield is made up of the crystalline and metamorphic rocks of the Scandinavian Shield. Finland Facts is a country of plateaus, with average altitudes varying between 120 and 180 m above sea level. The terrain, generally tabular, becomes more hilly in the north. of the country, near the chain of Scandes. It occupies the northwestern tip of Finland. It is dominated, near the Norwegian border, by the Haltiatunturi (1,328 m), the highest point in the country. The most northerly part of Finland, beyond the Arctic Circle, is called Lapland.

During the Quaternary glaciations, the whole country was covered by a vast ice sheet whose maximum thickness (around 3,500 m) was north of the Gulf of Bothnia (see glacier, ice age). The glacial footprint is present everywhere today (moraine deposits, moutonne rocks, lacustrine basins). The plateaus, planed by glaciers and dotted with lakes, are surmounted by accumulations of fluvio-morainic debris. These subglacial channels form, after the melting of the ice sheet, mounds several tens of meters high and aligned for several hundred kilometers.

5) HYDROGRAPHY:

Finland Facts is a country with poorly drained soil, Finland has a hydrographic network consisting mainly of lakes and swamps. There are some 188,000 lakes and ponds with an area of   over 500 m2, the most important of which are Saimaa (1,300 km²), Inari (1,000 km2) and Païjänne. Inland waters cover a total area of   30,000 km2, or almost 10% of 100 of the country's area. The main rivers are Tornio, Muonio, Kemi and Oulu, but only the latter can be used by large vessels. Lakes and rivers are frozen during the winter. The majority of the waters flow towards the Gulf of Finland, due to the phenomenon of isostatic recovery (from 0.3 to 1 m per century) that the country knows since the deglaciation. Finland thus sees its area increase by 1,000 km2 per century.

6) CLIMATE:

Because of its high latitude, Finland has a harsh subarctic climate with long, cold winters and short, relatively cool summers. The average temperature in July is 16 ° C. That of February is - 9 ° C. However, due to its latitudinal extension, the country presents climatic nuances. The climate of southern Finland, which is much less severe because of the moderating influence of the surrounding seas, is cold temperate. The number of days with a temperature equal to or greater than 5 ° C is on average 180, against only 110 in Lapland. Annual precipitation amounts to an average of 350 mm in the north and 700 mm in the south. They know an essentially summer diet. The snowpack is continuous for four or five months of the year in the south and nearly seven months in the north.

7) INDEPENDENCE:

Towards the end of World War I, Finland broke away from Russia when the Finnish Parliament approved the declaration of independence on December 6, 1917. Finland then became an independent country and that day is still celebrated as the Independence Day of Finland.

In the spring of 1918, a civil war broke out in Finland between the Reds, who represented the workers and the whites, composed of the bourgeois and the peasants. This war ended in May 1918 with the defeat of the Reds.

Independent Finland became a republic whose president was elected for a term of six years instead of a king or tsar and whose laws were passed by a parliament elected by the people.

Official Website: https://finland.fi/

Illustration Credits : Muhammad Sharjeel