33% of the residents are of East Indian descent, 33% Afro-Surinamese, 18% Indonesians, 9% Maroon, 2% Chinese and 2% Indians.
Religious affiliation
Around 23% are Roman Catholic, 20% Muslim, 27% Hindi and 25% are Protestants. Most of these are Anglicans. In Suriname there are also natural religions and Jews as small minorities.
National languages
Dutch is the official language. Hindi and Javanese are still spoken. English and Sranang Tongo are spoken as lingua franca.
Capital, other cities
The capital of Suriname is Paramaribo with a population of 300,000. According to Abbreviation Finder, SUR stands for Suriname in English. Click to see other meanings of this 3-letter acronym.
Another larger city is Wanica with around 55,000 residents
Suriname: geography
The country of Suriname is located on the northeast coast of South America and borders Brazil to the south, Guyana to the west, French Guiana to the east and the Atlantic Ocean to the north. The country is bordering the Caribbean. It is a member of Caricom, the “Caribbian Comunity”, a political association of the countries and island states of the Caribbean. Check topmbadirectory for politics, flags, famous people, animals and plants of Suriname.
Area, landscape and borders
Suriname can be divided into two regions: the agriculturally cultivated northern part, which only accounts for about 20% of the country’s surface, and the hardly inhabited south, which consists of savannahs and rainforest.
The area of the country is 163,265 km².
The country of Suriname shares a border with a total of three states. There are limits to:
Brazil with a length of around 593 km
Guyana with a length of around 726 km
French Guiana with a length of around 467 km.
Coast to the Atlantic
Suriname has a coast to the Atlantic with a length of a little less than 400 km.
The coastal plain is 50 to 80 km wide.
Some of the large swamps were drained during the colonial era. There is a conflict with Guyana over oil exploitation on the coast. The lowland, which is up to 5 meters below sea level and formed from alluvial land, is 70 kilometers wide on the coast and is secured against flooding with the help of dams. The adjacent part of the country is a flat hill country that rises up to 150 m high. The highlands take up about two thirds of the land area.
Tidal range
In Paramaribo, the mean tidal range is around 1.50 m.
For detailed explanations of ebb and flow, see Tides, Ebb and Flow.
Compare
Incidentally, 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
Suriname extends over the following geographical latitude (abbreviation Δφ) and geographical longitude (abbreviation Δλ):
Δφ = from 1 ° to 6 ° north latitude Δλ = from 53 ° to 58 ° west longitude
You can find detailed information on this subject under: Geographical longitude and latitude.
Legal time
For Surinam, the following value 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:
Δt (CET) = – 5 h
More detailed explanations of the time can be found under: Time zones, time.
The highest point of the sun in Paramaribo
Paramaribo lies at a northern latitude of around φ = 05 ° and is therefore in the middle of the tropics.
If the sun or its pixel is exactly above the city, i.e. at 05 ° N, the sun is exactly vertically above the city.
This happens exactly twice a year, roughly 26 days after March 21st and 26 days before September 21st (for details see position of the sun).
mountains
Julianatop
The highest mountain in the country is the Julianatop, located in the Wilhelminagebirge. It reaches a height of 1,280 m.
Other high mountains are:
the Van Asch Van Wijk
the Tumac-Humac mountains
the KayserMountains
Rivers
Corantyne
The longest river in the country is the Corantyne with a length of around 726 km.
Other rivers in the country that all flow into the Atlantic are:
Commewijne
Saramacca
Coppename
Marowijne
Suriname
Nickerie
Lakes
The country with its many rivers has a remarkable network of canals and lakes.
Prof.-Dr.-Ir.-WJ-Van-Blommestein-See
The largest lake is the Prof.-Dr.-Ir.-WJ-Van-Blommestein-See, fed by the Surinam river.
