About Japan

JAPAN

Location:

An island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of japan, china, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south.

Area:
More than 50% of the country is mountainous and covered by forests. Japan is politically structured into 8 regions and 47 prefectures

Population:
The population of Japan is about 125,000,000, including approximately two million foreign residents. More than half of this two million is of Korean descent.

Earthquakes and Volcanos:
Japan is located in a region where several continental plates meet therefore the country often experience earthquakes. For the same reason, there are many volcanos in Japan. Japan's most famous volcano and highest mountain is mount Fuji.

Climate:

The climate in most of the major cities (Tokyo) is temperate to subtropic and consists of four seasons. The winter is mild and the summer is hot and humid. There is a rainy season in early summer, and typhoons hit parts of the country every year during late summer. The climate of the northern island of Hokkaido and the Sea of Japan coast is colder, and snow falls in large amounts. In Okinawa, the mean temperature of January is a warm 17 degrees Celsius.

Capital:

Tokyo

Government:

Republic

Ethnic make-up:

Japanese 99%, others 1% (Korean 511,262, Chinese 244,241, Brazilian 182,232, Filipino 89,851, other 237914

Religious:

Both Shinto and Buddhist 84%, other 16% (including Christian 0.7%)