Natural hazards:
NA
Environment - current issues: soil pollution from pesticide use; southern part of the country contaminated with fallout from 1986 nuclear reactor accident at Chornobyl' in northern Ukraine
Environment - international agreements: party to: Air Pollution, Air Pollution-Nitrogen Oxides, Air Pollution-Sulfur 85, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Desertification, Endangered Species, Environmental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Marine Dumping, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands signed, but not ratified: Law of the Sea
Geography - note:
landlocked; glacial scouring accounts for the flatness of
Belarusian terrain and for its 11,000 lakes
People Belarus
Population:
10,293,011 (July 2006 est.)
Age structure:
0-14 years: 15.7% (male 825,823/female 791,741)
15-64 years: 69.7% (male 3,490,442/female 3,682,950)
65 years and over: 14.6% (male 498,976/female 1,003,079) (2006 est.)
Median age:
total: 37.2 years
male: 34.5 years
female: 39.9 years (2006 est.)
Population growth rate:
-0.06% (2006 est.)
Birth rate:
11.16 births/1,000 population (2006 est.)