note: see separate entries for the Faroe Islands and Greenland, which are part of the Kingdom of Denmark and are self-governing administrative divisions.
Population:
5,352,815 (July 2001 est.)
Currency:
Danish krone (DKK)
Languages:
Danish, Faroese, Greenlandic (an Inuit dialect), German (small minority)br>i>note
Elevation:
highest point: Yding Skovhoej 173 m
lowest point: Lammefjord -7 m
Natural hazards:
flooding is a threat in some areas of the country (e.g., parts of Jutland, along the southern coast of the island of Lolland) that are protected from the sea by a system of dikes
Climate:
temperate; humid and overcast; mild, windy winters and cool summers
This thoroughly modern market economy features high-tech agriculture, up-to-date small-scale and corporate industry, extensive government welfare measures, comfortable living standards, and high dependence on foreign trade. Denmark is a net exporter of food and energy and has a comfortable balance of payments surplus. The center-left coalition government has reduced the formerly high unemployment rate and attained a budget surplus as well as followed the previous government's policies of maintaining low inflation and a stable currency. The coalition has lowered marginal income tax rates and raised environmental taxes thus maintaining overall tax revenues. Problems of bottlenecks, and longer term demographic changes reducing the labor force, are being addressed through labor market reforms. The government has been successful in meeting, and even exceeding, the economic convergence criteria for participating in the third phase (a common European currency) of the European Monetary Union (EMU), but Denmark, in a September 2000 referendum, reconfirmed its decision not to join the 11 other EU members in the euro. Even so, the Danish currency remains pegged to the euro.
Industry:
food processing, machinery and equipment, textiles and clothing, chemical products, electronics, construction, furniture, and other wood products, shipbuilding, windmills
