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Azerbaijan Country Guide

Explore Azerbaijan in Asia

Azerbaijan with the capital city Baku is located in Asia (Southwestern Asia, bordering the Caspian Sea). It covers some 86,600 square kilometres (slightly smaller than Maine) with 8,177,000 citizens.

Interactive map of Azerbaijan

The landscape offers large, flat Kur-Araz Ovaligi (Kura-Araks Lowland) (much of it below sea level) with Great Caucasus Mountains to the north, Qarabag Yaylasi (Karabakh Upland) in west with Baku lies on Abseron Yasaqligi (Apsheron Peninsula) that juts into Caspian Sea. The average density of population is approximately 94 per km². The notable climate conditions in Azerbaijan can be described as dry, semiarid steppe. Potential threats by nature are droughts.

To reach someone in Azerbaijan dial +994 prior to a number. There are 1,397,000 installed telephones. And there are 7,757,000 registered mobile phones. The cellular networks commonly support frequencies of 900 MHz. Websites registered in this country end with the top level domain ".az". If you want to bring electric equipment on your trip (e.g. laptop power supply), note the local power outlet of 220V - 50Hz.

About the flag and history of Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan Flag Icon

Three equal horizontal bands of blue (top), red, and green; a crescent and eight-pointed star in white are centered in the red band; the blue band recalls Azerbaijan's Turkic heritage, red stands for modernization and progress, and green refers to Islam; the crescent moon is an Islamic symbol, while the eight-pointed star represents the eight Turkic peoples of the world.


Azerbaijan - a nation with a majority-Turkic and majority-Shia Muslim population - was briefly independent (from 1918 to 1920) following the collapse of the Russian Empire; it was subsequently incorporated into the Soviet Union for seven decades. Azerbaijan has yet to resolve its conflict with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, a primarily Armenian-populated region that Moscow recognized in 1923 as an autonomous region within Soviet Azerbaijan after Armenia and Azerbaijan disputed the status of the territory. Armenia and Azerbaijan began fighting over the area in 1988; the struggle escalated after both countries attained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. By May 1994, when a cease-fire took hold, ethnic Armenian forces held not only Nagorno-Karabakh but also seven surrounding provinces in the territory of Azerbaijan. The OSCE Minsk Group, co-chaired by the United States, France, and Russia, is the framework established to mediate a peaceful resolution of the conflict. Corruption in the country is widespread, and the government, which eliminated presidential term limits in a 2009 referendum, has been accused of authoritarianism. Although the poverty rate has been reduced and infrastructure investment has increased substantially in recent years due to revenue from oil and gas production, reforms have not adequately addressed weaknesses in most government institutions, particularly in the education and health sectors. In January 2012, Azerbaijan assumed a nonpermanent seat on the UN Security Council for the 2012-13 term.



Geography Quick-Facts

SummaryContinent: Asia
Neighbours: Georgia, Iran, Armenia, Turkey, Russia
Capital: Baku
Size86,600 square kilometers (km² or sqkm) or 33,436 square miles (mi² or sqmi)
slightly smaller than Maine
Population8,177,000
CurrencyName Manat, Currency Code:AZM
Country Top Level Domain (cTLD).az
Telephone Country Prefix+994
Mobile Phone Connections7,757,000
Landline Phone Connections1,397,000

Country Position in World Rankings

Information about single country attributes and how these compare against the rest of the world. The information below is compiled with data from 2013. As such, it may differ a bit to the Information above in the text (which is from 2010).

Geography

Value nameValueWorld Rank
Area86,600 (sq km)113

People and Society

Value nameValueWorld Rank
Population9,590,159 91
Population growth rate1.01 (%)113
Birth rate17.17 (births/1,000 population)111
Death rate7.11 (deaths/1,000 population)127
Maternal mortality rate43.00 (deaths/100,000 live births)113
Infant mortality rate27.69 (deaths/1,000 live births)70
Life expectancy at birth71.61 (years)142
Total fertility rate1.92 (children born/woman)137
Health expenditures5.90 (% of GDP)111
HIV/AIDS - adult prevalence rate0.10 (%)113
HIV/AIDS - people living with HIV/AIDS3,600 125
HIV/AIDS - deaths200 108
Obesity - adult prevalence rate23.80 (%)71
Children under the age of 5 years underweight8.40 (%)73
Education expenditures2.80 (% of GDP)148
Unemployment, youth ages 15-2414.70 (%)86

Economy

Value nameValueWorld Rank
GDP (purchasing power parity)98,360,000,000 75
GDP - real growth rate2.20 (%)129
GDP - per capita (PPP)10,700 113
Labor force6,206,000 66
Unemployment rate1.00 (%)7
Distribution of family income - Gini index33.70 95
Investment (gross fixed)17.20 (% of GDP)124
Taxes and other revenues33.80 (% of GDP)71
Budget surplus (+) or deficit (-)-3.30 (% of GDP)119
Public debt5.40 (% of GDP)149
Inflation rate (consumer prices)7.40 (%)179
Central bank discount rate5.25 (%)66
Commercial bank prime lending rate19.00 (%)19
Stock of narrow money14,160,000,000 68
Stock of broad money17,680,000,000 90
Stock of domestic credit13,780,000,000 91
Industrial production growth rate-5.20 (%)162
Current account balance12,300,000,000 24
Exports30,580,000,000 64
Imports10,780,000,000 92
Reserves of foreign exchange and gold9,870,000,000 75
Debt - external4,042,000,000 128
Stock of direct foreign investment - at home11,700,000,000 81
Stock of direct foreign investment - abroad6,923,000,000 59

Energy

Value nameValueWorld Rank
Electricity - production20,000,000,000 (kWh)74
Electricity - consumption13,480,000,000 (kWh)80
Electricity - exports380,000,000 (kWh)64
Electricity - imports110,000,000 (kWh)93
Electricity - installed generating capacity5,798,000 (kW)72
Electricity - from fossil fuels82.30 (% of total installed capacity)91
Electricity - from hydroelectric plants17.70 (% of total installed capacity)98
Crude oil - production987,000 (bbl/day)21
Crude oil - exports821,000 (bbl/day)16
Crude oil - proved reserves7,000,000,000 (bbl)21
Refined petroleum products - production161,100 (bbl/day)63
Refined petroleum products - consumption168,000 (bbl/day)64
Refined petroleum products - exports63,950 (bbl/day)54
Refined petroleum products - imports1,426 (bbl/day)188
Natural gas - production16,680,000,000 (cu m)37
Natural gas - consumption9,921,000,000 (cu m)48
Natural gas - exports6,755,000,000 (cu m)28
Natural gas - proved reserves849,500,000,000 (cu m)27
Carbon dioxide emissions from consumption of energy35,120,000 (Mt)73

Communications

Value nameValueWorld Rank
Telephones - main lines in use1,684,000 64
Telephones - mobile cellular10,120,000 76
Internet hosts46,856 98
Internet users2,420,000 70

Transportation

Value nameValueWorld Rank
Airports37 109
Railways2,918 (km)57
Roadways52,942 (km)76
Merchant marine90 53

Military

Value nameValueWorld Rank
Military expenditures2.60 (% of GDP)50

Data based on CIA facts book 2010 & 2013, wikipedia, national statistical offices and their census releases

List of current world heritage sites

NameSince
Gobustan Rock Art Cultural Landscape
Gobustan Rock Art Cultural Landscape covers three areas of a plateau of rocky boulders rising out of the semi-desert of central Azerbaijan, with an outstanding collection of more than 6,000 rock engravings bearing testimony to 40,000 years of rock ar ...
2007
Walled City of Baku with the Shirvanshah's Palace and Maiden Tower
Built on a site inhabited since the Palaeolithic period, the Walled City of Baku reveals evidence of Zoroastrian, Sasanian, Arabic, Persian, Shirvani, Ottoman, and Russian presence in cultural continuity. The Inner City (Icheri Sheher) has preserved ...
2000