Flag of El Salvador
By: Donna Welles
El Salvador has defaulted on its national currency and now uses instead the United States Dollar. Violence in El Salvador is well documented by the media. El Salvador shares land borders with Honduras and Guatemala and they sit across the bay from Nicaragua. Salvador Sanchez Ceren has been the President of El Salvador since 2014.
El Salvador is burdened by an annual net trade deficit of roughly $5b USD. In 2006, El Salvador reported $4b USD in exports and $8b USD in imports. In 2015, El Salvador reported $5b USD in exports and $10b USD in imports. Therefore in the previous decade the annual net trade deficit has increased from $4b USD to $5b USD.
El Salvador exports what the World Bank categorizes as miscellaneous manufactured goods. Annually they enjoy roughly a $1b USD trade surplus in miscellaneous manufactured goods. In 2006, El Salvador exported $2b USD in miscellaneous manufactured goods and that amount increased by 2015 to $3b USD.
El Salvador has an army of 42,000 soldiers which is slightly fewer than Guatemala which has an army of 43,000 soldiers. The Mexican Army has 336,000 soldiers. Guatemala has the highest fertility rates in the region at 3.2 births per woman. El Salvador has a fertility rate which is slightly lower than that of Mexico. Mexico reported a fertility rate in 2014 of 2.2 births per woman and El Salvador reported a fertility rate that year of 1.9 births per woman.
In terms of land area, El Salvador is roughly 21,000 sq km whereas Guatemala is 107,000 sq km. Mexico has a land area of 2m sq km. El Salvador enjoys a higher life expectancy than Guatemala. In 2014, El Salvador reported a life expectancy of 73 years whereas Guatemala reported a life expectancy of 72 years. Life expectancy in Mexico is 77 years. Literacy in the region is roughly 90 percent. El Salvador reported a literacy rate of nearly exactly 90 percent while Mexico reported a literacy rate of 96 percent. Guatemala reported a literacy rate of 85 percent.
Mexico City is the capital of Mexico and it has a population of 21m people. San Salvador is the capital of El Salvador and it has a population of 1m people. Guatemala City is larger than San Salvador. In 2015, Guatemala City had a population of 3m people. Total population figures are such that Mexico has a population of 130m people, Guatemala has a population of 16m people, and El Salvador has a population of 6m people.
