Cayman Islands (2001) | World (2005) | |
Administrative divisions | 8 districts; Creek, Eastern, Midland, South Town, Spot Bay, Stake Bay, West End, Western | 271 nations, dependent areas, and other entities |
Age structure | 0-14 years:
22.21% (male 3,807; female 4,084) 15-64 years: 69.74% (male 12,102; female 12,676) 65 years and over: 8.05% (male 1,318; female 1,540) (2001 est.) |
0-14 years: 27.8% (male 919,726,623; female 870,468,158)
15-64 years: 64.9% (male 2,117,230,183; female 2,066,864,970) 65 years and over: 7.3% (male 207,903,775; female 263,627,270) note: some countries do not maintain age structure information, thus a slight discrepancy exists between the total world population and the total for world age structure (2005 est.) |
Agriculture - products | vegetables, fruit; livestock, turtle farming | - |
Airports | 3 (2000 est.) | 49,973 (2004) |
Airports - with paved runways | total:
2 1,524 to 2,437 m: 2 (2000 est.) |
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Airports - with unpaved runways | total:
1 914 to 1,523 m: 1 (2000 est.) |
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Area | total:
259 sq km land: 259 sq km water: 0 sq km |
total: 510.072 million sq km
land: 148.94 million sq km water: 361.132 million sq km note: 70.8% of the world's surface is water, 29.2% is land |
Area - comparative | 1.5 times the size of Washington, DC | land area about 16 times the size of the US |
Background | The Cayman Islands were colonized from Jamaica by the British during the 18th and 19th centuries. Administered by Jamaica from 1863, they remained a British dependency after 1962 when the former became independent. | Globally, the 20th century was marked by: (a) two devastating world wars; (b) the Great Depression of the 1930s; (c) the end of vast colonial empires; (d) rapid advances in science and technology, from the first airplane flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina (US) to the landing on the moon; (e) the Cold War between the Western alliance and the Warsaw Pact nations; (f) a sharp rise in living standards in North America, Europe, and Japan; (g) increased concerns about the environment, including loss of forests, shortages of energy and water, the decline in biological diversity, and air pollution; (h) the onset of the AIDS epidemic; and (i) the ultimate emergence of the US as the only world superpower. The planet's population continues to explode: from 1 billion in 1820, to 2 billion in 1930, 3 billion in 1960, 4 billion in 1974, 5 billion in 1988, and 6 billion in 2000. For the 21st century, the continued exponential growth in science and technology raises both hopes (e.g., advances in medicine) and fears (e.g., development of even more lethal weapons of war). |
Birth rate | 13.79 births/1,000 population (2001 est.) | 20.15 births/1,000 population (2005 est.) |
Budget | revenues:
$265.2 million expenditures: $248.9 million, including capital expenditures of $NA (1997) |
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Capital | George Town | - |
Climate | tropical marine; warm, rainy summers (May to October) and cool, relatively dry winters (November to April) | two large areas of polar climates separated by two rather narrow temperate zones form a wide equatorial band of tropical to subtropical climates |
Coastline | 160 km | 356,000 km
note: 98 nations and other entities are islands that border no other countries, they include: American Samoa, Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Ashmore and Cartier Islands, The Bahamas, Bahrain, Baker Island, Barbados, Bassas da India, Bermuda, Bouvet Island, British Indian Ocean Territory, British Virgin Islands, Cape Verde, Cayman Islands, Christmas Island, Clipperton Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Comoros, Cook Islands, Coral Sea Islands, Cuba, Cyprus, Dominica, Europa Island, Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas), Faroe Islands, Fiji, French Polynesia, French Southern and Antarctic Lands, Glorioso Islands, Greenland, Grenada, Guam, Guernsey, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, Howland Island, Iceland, Jamaica, Jan Mayen, Japan, Jarvis Island, Jersey, Johnston Atoll, Juan de Nova Island, Kingman Reef, Kiribati, Madagascar, Maldives, Malta, Isle of Man, Marshall Islands, Martinique, Mauritius, Mayotte, Federated States of Micronesia, Midway Islands, Montserrat, Nauru, Navassa Island, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Niue, Norfolk Island, Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Palmyra Atoll, Paracel Islands, Philippines, Pitcairn Islands, Puerto Rico, Reunion, Saint Helena, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa, Sao Tome and Principe, Seychelles, Singapore, Solomon Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, Spratly Islands, Sri Lanka, Svalbard, Tokelau, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tromelin Island, Turks and Caicos Islands, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Virgin Islands, Wake Island, Wallis and Futuna, Taiwan |
Constitution | 1959, revised 1972 and 1992 | - |
Country name | conventional long form:
none conventional short form: Cayman Islands |
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Currency | Caymanian dollar (KYD) | - |
Death rate | 5.15 deaths/1,000 population (2001 est.) | 8.78 deaths/1,000 population (2005 est.) |
Debt - external | $70 million (1996) | $12.7 trillion (2004 est.) |
Dependency status | overseas territory of the UK | - |
Diplomatic representation from the US | none (overseas territory of the UK) | - |
Diplomatic representation in the US | none (overseas territory of the UK) | - |
Disputes - international | none | stretching over 250,000 km, the world's 325 international land boundaries separate the 192 independent states and 73 dependencies, areas of special sovereignty, and other miscellaneous entities; ethnicity, culture, race, religion, and language have divided states into separate political entities as much as history, physical terrain, political fiat, or conquest, resulting in sometimes arbitrary and imposed boundaries; maritime states have claimed limits and have so far established over 130 maritime boundaries and joint development zones to allocate ocean resources and to provide for national security at sea; boundary, borderland/resource, and territorial disputes vary in intensity from managed or dormant to violent or militarized; most disputes over the alignment of political boundaries are confined to short segments and are today less common and less hostile than borderland, resource, and territorial disputes; undemarcated, indefinite, porous, and unmanaged boundaries, however, encourage illegal cross-border activities, uncontrolled migration, and confrontation; territorial disputes may evolve from historical and/or cultural claims, or they may be brought on by resource competition; ethnic clashes continue to be responsible for much of the territorial fragmentation around the world; disputes over islands at sea or in rivers frequently form the source of territorial and boundary conflict; other sources of contention include access to water and mineral (especially petroleum) resources, fisheries, and arable land; nonetheless, most nations cooperate to clarify their international boundaries and to resolve territorial and resource disputes peacefully; regional discord directly affects the sustenance and welfare of local populations, often leaving the world community to cope with resultant refugees, hunger, disease, impoverishment, deforestation, and desertification |
Economic aid - recipient | $NA | $154 billion official development assistance (ODA) (2004) |
Economy - overview | With no direct taxation, the islands are a thriving offshore financial center. More than 40,000 companies were registered in the Cayman Islands as of 1997, including almost 600 banks and trust companies; banking assets exceed $500 billion. A stock exchange was opened in 1997. Tourism is also a mainstay, accounting for about 70% of GDP and 75% of foreign currency earnings. The tourist industry is aimed at the luxury market and caters mainly to visitors from North America. Total tourist arrivals exceeded 1.2 million visitors in 1997. About 90% of the islands' food and consumer goods must be imported. The Caymanians enjoy one of the highest outputs per capita and one of the highest standards of living in the world. | Global output rose by 4.9% in 2004, led by China (9.1%), Russia (6.7%), and India (6.2%). The other 14 successor nations of the USSR and the other old Warsaw Pact nations again experienced widely divergent growth rates; the three Baltic nations continued as strong performers, in the 7% range of growth. Growth results posted by the major industrial countries varied from a small gain in Italy (1.3%) to a strong gain by the United States (4.4%). The developing nations also varied in their growth results, with many countries facing population increases that erode gains in output. Externally, the nation-state, as a bedrock economic-political institution, is steadily losing control over international flows of people, goods, funds, and technology. Internally, the central government often finds its control over resources slipping as separatist regional movements - typically based on ethnicity - gain momentum, e.g., in many of the successor states of the former Soviet Union, in the former Yugoslavia, in India, in Iraq, in Indonesia, and in Canada. Externally, the central government is losing decisionmaking powers to international bodies, notably the European Union. In Western Europe, governments face the difficult political problem of channeling resources away from welfare programs in order to increase investment and strengthen incentives to seek employment. The addition of 75 million people each year to an already overcrowded globe is exacerbating the problems of pollution, desertification, underemployment, epidemics, and famine. Because of their own internal problems and priorities, the industrialized countries devote insufficient resources to deal effectively with the poorer areas of the world, which, at least from an economic point of view, are becoming further marginalized. The introduction of the euro as the common currency of much of Western Europe in January 1999, while paving the way for an integrated economic powerhouse, poses economic risks because of varying levels of income and cultural and political differences among the participating nations. The terrorist attacks on the US on 11 September 2001 accentuate a further growing risk to global prosperity, illustrated, for example, by the reallocation of resources away from investment to anti-terrorist programs. The opening of war in March 2003 between a US-led coalition and Iraq added new uncertainties to global economic prospects. After the coalition victory, the complex political difficulties and the high economic cost of establishing domestic order in Iraq became major global problems that continued into 2005. |
Electricity - consumption | 306.9 million kWh (1999) | 14.28 trillion kWh (2002 est.) |
Electricity - exports | 0 kWh (1999) | 500.8 billion kWh (2002 est.) |
Electricity - imports | 0 kWh (1999) | 497.6 billion kWh (2002 est.) |
Electricity - production | 330 million kWh (1999) | 15.29 trillion kWh (2002 est.) |
Electricity - production by source | fossil fuel:
100% hydro: 0% nuclear: 0% other: 0% (1999) |
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Elevation extremes | lowest point:
Caribbean Sea 0 m highest point: The Bluff 43 m |
lowest point: Bentley Subglacial Trench -2,540 m
note: in the oceanic realm, Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench is the lowest point, lying -10,924 m below the surface of the Pacific Ocean highest point: Mount Everest 8,850 m |
Environment - current issues | no natural fresh water resources; drinking water supplies must be met by rainwater catchment | large areas subject to overpopulation, industrial disasters, pollution (air, water, acid rain, toxic substances), loss of vegetation (overgrazing, deforestation, desertification), loss of wildlife, soil degradation, soil depletion, erosion |
Ethnic groups | mixed 40%, white 20%, black 20%, expatriates of various ethnic groups 20% | - |
Exchange rates | Caymanian dollars per US dollar - 0.83 (3 November 1995), 0.85 (22 November 1993) | - |
Executive branch | chief of state:
Queen ELIZABETH II (since 6 February 1952); Governor and President of the Executive Council Peter SMITH (since 5 May 1999) head of government: Kurt TIBBETTS (since November 2000) cabinet: Executive Council (three members appointed by the governor, four members elected by the Legislative Assembly) elections: none; the monarch is hereditary; the governor is appointed by the monarch |
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Exports | $1.5 million (1998) | 693.7 billion cu m (2001 est.) |
Exports - commodities | turtle products, manufactured consumer goods | the whole range of industrial and agricultural goods and services |
Exports - partners | mostly US | US 15.7%, Germany 7.7%, China 5.4%, France 5.1%, UK 5.1%, Japan 4.5% (2004) |
Fiscal year | 1 April - 31 March | - |
Flag description | blue, with the flag of the UK in the upper hoist-side quadrant and the Caymanian coat of arms on a white disk centered on the outer half of the flag; the coat of arms includes a pineapple and turtle above a shield with three stars (representing the three islands) and a scroll at the bottom bearing the motto HE HATH FOUNDED IT UPON THE SEAS | - |
GDP | purchasing power parity - $930 million (1997 est.) | - |
GDP - composition by sector | agriculture:
1.4% industry: 3.2% services: 95.4% (1994 est.) |
agriculture: 4%
industry: 32% services: 64% (2004 est.) |
GDP - per capita | purchasing power parity - $24,500 (1997 est.) | purchasing power parity - $8,800 (2004 est.) |
GDP - real growth rate | 4.9% (1999 est.) | 4.9% (2004 est.) |
Geographic coordinates | 19 30 N, 80 30 W | - |
Geography - note | important location between Cuba and Central America | the world is now thought to be about 4.55 billion years old, just about one-third of the 13-billion-year age estimated for the universe |
Highways | total:
406 km paved: 304 km unpaved: 102 km |
total: 32,345,165 km
paved: 19,403,061 km unpaved: 12,942,104 km (2002) |
Household income or consumption by percentage share | lowest 10%:
NA% highest 10%: NA% |
lowest 10%: NA %
highest 10%: NA % |
Illicit drugs | vulnerable to drug money laundering and drug transshipment to the US and Europe | cocaine: worldwide, coca is grown on an estimated 173,450 hectares - almost exclusively in South America with 70% in Colombia; potential cocaine production during 2003 is estimated at 728 metric tons (or 835 metric tons of export quality cocaine); coca eradication programs continue in Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru; 376 metric tons of export quality cocaine are documented to have been seized in 2003, and 26 metric tons disrupted (jettisoned or destroyed); consumption of export quality cocaine is estimated to have been 800 metric tons
opiates: cultivation of opium poppy occurred on an estimated 137,944 hectares in 2003 - mostly in Southwest and Southeast Asia - with 44% in Afghanistan, potentially produced 3,775 metric tons of opium, which conceivably could be converted to the equivalent of 429 metric tons of pure heroin; opium eradication programs have been undertaken in Afghanistan, Burma, Colombia, Mexico, Pakistan, Thailand, and Vietnam |
Imports | $507.6 million (1998) | 718.7 billion cu m (2001 est.) |
Imports - commodities | foodstuffs, manufactured goods | the whole range of industrial and agricultural goods and services |
Imports - partners | US, Trinidad and Tobago, UK, Netherlands Antilles, Japan | Germany 9.4%, US 9.3%, China 8.5%, Japan 6.5%, France 4.5% (2004) |
Independence | none (overseas territory of the UK) | - |
Industrial production growth rate | NA% | 3% (2003 est.) |
Industries | tourism, banking, insurance and finance, construction, construction materials, furniture | dominated by the onrush of technology, especially in computers, robotics, telecommunications, and medicines and medical equipment; most of these advances take place in OECD nations; only a small portion of non-OECD countries have succeeded in rapidly adjusting to these technological forces; the accelerated development of new industrial (and agricultural) technology is complicating already grim environmental problems |
Infant mortality rate | 10.16 deaths/1,000 live births (2001 est.) | total: 50.11 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 52.1 deaths/1,000 live births female: 48.01 deaths/1,000 live births (2005 est.) |
Inflation rate (consumer prices) | 3% (1998) | developed countries 1% to 4% typically; developing countries 5% to 60% typically; national inflation rates vary widely in individual cases, from declining prices in Japan to hyperinflation in several Third World countries (2004 est.) |
International organization participation | Caricom (observer), CDB, Interpol (subbureau), IOC, UNESCO (associate) | - |
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) | 16 (2000) | - |
Irrigated land | NA sq km | 2,714,320 sq km (1998 est.) |
Judicial branch | Summary Court; Grand Court; Cayman Islands Court of Appeal | - |
Labor force | 19,820 (1995) | NA |
Labor force - by occupation | agriculture 1.4%, industry 12.6%, services 86% (1995) | agriculture NA%, industry NA%, services NA% |
Land boundaries | 0 km | the land boundaries in the world total 250,472 km (not counting shared boundaries twice); two nations, China and Russia, each border 14 other countries
note: 43 nations and other areas are landlocked, these include: Afghanistan, Andorra, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bhutan, Bolivia, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Czech Republic, Ethiopia, Holy See (Vatican City), Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Lesotho, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malawi, Mali, Moldova, Mongolia, Nepal, Niger, Paraguay, Rwanda, San Marino, Slovakia, Swaziland, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Uzbekistan, West Bank, Zambia, Zimbabwe; two of these, Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan, are doubly landlocked |
Land use | arable land:
0% permanent crops: 0% permanent pastures: 8% forests and woodland: 23% other: 69% (1993 est.) |
arable land: 10.73%
permanent crops: 1% other: 88.27% (2001) |
Languages | English | Chinese, Mandarin 13.69%, Spanish 5.05%, English 4.84%, Hindi 2.82%, Portuguese 2.77%, Bengali 2.68%, Russian 2.27%, Japanese 1.99%, German, Standard 1.49%, Chinese, Wu 1.21% (2004 est.)
note: percents are for "first language" speakers only |
Legal system | British common law and local statutes | all members of the UN are parties to the statute that established the International Court of Justice (ICJ) or World Court |
Legislative branch | unicameral Legislative Assembly (18 seats, three appointed members and 15 elected by popular vote; members serve four-year terms)
elections: last held 8 November 2000 (next to be held NA November 2004) election results: percent of vote - NA%; seats - NA |
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Life expectancy at birth | total population:
79.03 years male: 76.24 years female: 81.43 years (2001 est.) |
total population: 64.33 years
male: 62.73 years female: 66.04 years (2005 est.) |
Literacy | definition:
age 15 and over has ever attended school total population: 98% male: 98% female: 98% (1970 est.) |
definition: age 15 and over can read and write
total population: 82% male: 87% female: 77% note: over two-thirds of the world's 785 million illiterate adults are found in only eight countries (India, China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Indonesia, and Egypt); of all the illiterate adults in the world, two-thirds are women; extremely low literacy rates are concentrated in three regions, South and West Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and the Arab states, where around one-third of the men and half of all women are illiterate (2005 est.) |
Location | Caribbean, island group in Caribbean Sea, nearly one-half of the way from Cuba to Honduras | - |
Map references | Central America and the Caribbean | Physical Map of the World, Political Map of the World, Standard Time Zones of the World |
Maritime claims | exclusive fishing zone:
200 NM territorial sea: 12 NM |
a variety of situations exist, but in general, most countries make the following claims measured from the mean low-tide baseline as described in the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea: territorial sea - 12 nm , contiguous zone - 24 nm , and exclusive economic zone - 200 nm ; additional zones provide for exploitation of continental shelf resources and an exclusive fishing zone; boundary situations with neighboring states prevent many countries from extending their fishing or economic zones to a full 200 nm |
Merchant marine | total:
106 ships (1,000 GRT or over) totaling 1,656,452 GRT/2,643,036 DWT ships by type: bulk 21, cargo 5, chemical tanker 27, container 4, liquefied gas 1, petroleum tanker 13, refrigerated cargo 30, roll on/roll off 4, specialized tanker 1 note: includes some foreign-owned ships registered here as a flag of convenience: Cyprus 2, Denmark 2, Finland 1, Greece 11, Norway 3, UK 3, US 3 (2000 est.) |
total ships: 30,936 (2005) |
Military - note | defense is the responsibility of the UK | - |
Military branches | Royal Cayman Islands Police Force (RCIPF) | - |
Military expenditures - dollar figure | - | aggregate real expenditure on arms worldwide in 1999 remained at approximately the 1998 level, about three-quarters of a trillion dollars (1999 est.) |
Military expenditures - percent of GDP | - | roughly 2% of gross world product (1999 est.) |
National holiday | Constitution Day, first Monday in July | - |
Nationality | noun:
Caymanian(s) adjective: Caymanian |
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Natural hazards | hurricanes (July to November) | large areas subject to severe weather (tropical cyclones), natural disasters (earthquakes, landslides, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions) |
Natural resources | fish, climate and beaches that foster tourism | the rapid depletion of nonrenewable mineral resources, the depletion of forest areas and wetlands, the extinction of animal and plant species, and the deterioration in air and water quality (especially in Eastern Europe, the former USSR, and China) pose serious long-term problems that governments and peoples are only beginning to address |
Net migration rate | 12.58 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2001 est.)
note: major destination for Cubans trying to migrate to the US |
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Political parties and leaders | there are no formal political parties but the following loose groupings act as political organizations; National Team; Democratic Alliance; Team Cayman | - |
Political pressure groups and leaders | NA | - |
Population | 35,527 (July 2001 est.) | 6,446,131,400 (July 2005 est.) |
Population below poverty line | NA% | - |
Population growth rate | 2.12% (2001 est.) | 1.14% (2005 est.) |
Ports and harbors | Cayman Brac, George Town | - |
Radio broadcast stations | AM 1, FM 5, shortwave 0 (1998) | AM NA, FM NA, shortwave NA |
Radios | 36,000 (1997) | - |
Railways | 0 km | total: 1,115,205 km
broad gauge: 257,481 km standard gauge: 671,413 km narrow gauge: 186,311 km (2003) |
Religions | United Church (Presbyterian and Congregational), Anglican, Baptist, Roman Catholic, Church of God, other Protestant | Christians 32.84% (of which Roman Catholics 17.34%, Protestants 5.78%, Orthodox 3.44%, Anglicans 1.27%), Muslims 19.9%, Hindus 13.29%, Buddhists 5.92%, Sikhs 0.39%, Jews 0.23%, other religions 12.63%, non-religious 12.44%, atheists 2.36% (2003 est.) |
Sex ratio | at birth:
0.86 male(s)/female under 15 years: 0.93 male(s)/female 15-64 years: 0.95 male(s)/female 65 years and over: 0.86 male(s)/female total population: 0.94 male(s)/female (2001 est.) |
at birth: 1.06 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.06 male(s)/female 15-64 years: 1.03 male(s)/female 65 years and over: 0.79 male(s)/female total population: 1.01 male(s)/female (2005 est.) |
Suffrage | 18 years of age; universal | - |
Telephone system | general assessment:
NA domestic: NA international: 1 submarine coaxial cable; satellite earth station - 1 Intelsat (Atlantic Ocean) |
general assessment: NA
domestic: NA international: NA |
Telephones - main lines in use | 19,000 (1995) | 843,923,500 (2003) |
Telephones - mobile cellular | 2,534 (1995) | NA |
Television broadcast stations | NA | NA |
Terrain | low-lying limestone base surrounded by coral reefs | the greatest ocean depth is the Mariana Trench at 10,924 m in the Pacific Ocean |
Total fertility rate | 2.04 children born/woman (2001 est.) | 2.6 children born/woman (2005 est.) |
Unemployment rate | 4.1% (1997) | 30% combined unemployment and underemployment in many non-industrialized countries; developed countries typically 4%-12% unemployment |
Waterways | none | 671,886 km (2004) |