99.7% are Christians of the following faiths: Congregational Church Anglican Faith, Catholics, Methodists, Seven Day Adventists, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), Jehovah’s Witnesses and Baha’is.
The Christian religion plays an important role in society. Samoa is also part of the Pacific “biblebelt”, the Bible belt. A Samoan family usually goes to church on Sunday mornings. Then you have lunch together, to’onai, and then let the day end calmly.
Languages
Samoan
English
Capital, other cities
The capital of Samoa is Apia on the island of Upolu, with a population of approximately 38,800. According to Abbreviation Finder, ASM stands for Samoa in English. Click to see other meanings of this 3-letter acronym.
Another larger city is Gataivai, with around 1,200 residents and thus the largest city on the island of Savaii.
Samoa: map
The islands of Samoa are located in the middle of the southern Pacific. Check topmbadirectory for politics, flags, famous people, animals and plants of Samoa.
The island state lies, rounded up, on a geographical longitude between 171 ° and 173 ° West and a geographical latitude between 13 ° and 14 ° South, with American Samoa to the east. Samoa lies to the east of the international date line, which bends back to the west south of Samoa and returns to the 180 ° line. The date line has a bulge around the Chatam Islands, making them the same date as their motherland New Zealand.
Samoa is approximately 2,890 km from Auckland, 4,000 km from Sydney and 8,400 km from San Francisco.
The closest neighboring islands are Tonga in the south, Fiji in the southwest, Tuvalu in the northeast, Tokelau in the north and the Cook Islands in the east.
geography
The islands of Samoa
The country consists of the two main islands Savaii and Upolu as well as Apolima and Manono and other uninhabited smaller islands:
Savaii covers an area of 1,718 km² and approx. 41,800 residents.
Upolu covers an area of 1,125 km² and approx. 131,280 residents.
Manono covers an area of 3 km² and approx. 950 residents.
Apolima covers an area of 1 km² and about 80 residents.
The other islands are:
Fanuatapu, Namua, Nuulopa, Nuulua, Nuusafee and Nuutele.
Area and land use
Samoa covers a total area of 2,944 km². Of this total area, 2,934 km² are land and only 10 km² are water.
The land area of Samoa is used as follows:
Arable land: 21.2%
permanent cultivation area: 24.38%
Coastline
Samoa has a coastline of around 400 km.
Tidal range
In Samoa, the mean tidal range is between 0.5 and 1 m.
Compare
The world’s highest tidal range can be found in the Bay of Fundy in Canada, where it is up to 16 meters, and at spring tide even over 20 meters. The Bay of Fundy is located on the Atlantic between the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, which is called Nova Scotia in German and whose capital is Halifax.
On the German North Sea coast it varies between one and three meters. In the western Baltic Sea, on the other hand, the tidal range is only 0.3 meters, while it is barely noticeable in the eastern Baltic Sea.
Longitude and latitude
Samoa extends over the following geographical latitude (abbreviation Δφ) and geographical longitude (abbreviation Δλ):
Δφ = from 13 ° 15 ‘to 14 ° 05’ south latitude Δλ = from 171 ° 20 ‘to 172 ° 50’ west longitude
You can find detailed information on this subject under Longitude and Latitude.
Legal time
For Samoa, the value below applies to Central European Time (CET), i.e. the time without summer time. A minus sign means that it is earlier there, a plus sign that it is later than CET.
Samoa joined the western date line at the end of 2011 and “skipped” December 30th. The island state has a time that is only one hour different from that of its largest trading partners New Zealand and Australia.
Δt (CET) = +13 h
Further and detailed explanations of the time can be found under Time zones, time.
The highest point of the sun in Apia
Apia, the capital of Samoa, is located at a southern latitude of around φ = 14 °, in the middle of the tropics.
If the sun, or its image point, is exactly above the city or the island, i.e. at 14 ‘S, the sun is exactly vertically above the city. This happens exactly twice a year, roughly 53 days before March 21st and 53 days after September 21st.
Mountains
Mt.Silisili
The highest mountain in the country is Mt. Silisili with a height of 1,858 m on the island of Savaií.
Other high mountains are:
Mt.Mata´ga on the island of Savaií, with an altitude of 1,714 m.
Mt.Teélagi on the island of Savaií, with an altitude of 1,617 m.
Mt.Fito on Upolu Island with a height of 1,158 m.
Rivers
Mali’oli’o River
The longest river in the country is the Mali’oli’o River.
Lakes
LakeLanoto’o
The largest lake in Samoa is Lake Lannoto’o.
Pacific Ocean
Samoa borders the Pacific Ocean with a total coastline of 400 km – more precisely Samoa is located in the South Pacific, the so-called South Pacific. This region of the Pacific Ocean includes the Polynesian Islands as well as parts of Melanesia and Micronesia.
