6.Population.

More than 460 million people live in North America. The average density of population is 15 persons to a square km. The highest density (200 persons to a sq km) is near the Great Lakes, in the eastern part of the continent and on the islands in the Caribbean Sea. Less populated territories are in the north of the continent. Greenland is unpopulated. The native population of North America consists of the Indians and the Eskimos. The majority of people are descendants of settlers from Europe. There are also many Negroes in North America. The greater part of the continent is occupied by three big countries Canada, the USA and Mexico. There are also many small countries in Central America.

Home task: choose any country and make a report according to the plan (see page 18).

Country	Area (th sq km)	Population (mln)	Capital
Guatemala	109	10.6	Guatemala
Honduras	112.1	5.5	Tegucigalpa
Nicaragua	130	4.4	Managua
Panama	77.1	2.6	Panama
Haiti	27.8	6.9	Port-au-Prince
Belize	23	0.2	Belmopan
Salvador	21.4	5.9	San Salvador
Costa Rica	51.1	3.3	San Jose
Cuba	111	11.2	Havana
Canada	9 976	29.6	Ottawa
Mexico	1 973.2	93.7	Mexico-City
The USA	9 363.2	263.2	Washington D.C.
The Dominican Republic	48.7	7.8	Santo-Domingo

Cuba.

Cuba is rather a small country of North America, which is situated on the biggest island of the Caribbean Sea and on some small groups of nearby islands. The total area of the country is 110 860 thousand sq km. It is a republic, where state power belongs to the State Committee. The state language is Spanish. The population of Cuba is 11 million 184 thousand people.

The climate here is subtropical. The average t^o is +25 ^o C. Rains last from May until October. The amount of rainfalls here is rather high – 1 400 mm a year.

The climate is very good for the vegetation here. There are many tropical plants in Cuba. You can find 30 kinds of different palms on the islands of the country. Red-trees, sandals, poplars and pines also grow in the forests of Cuba. Some parts of the country are covered with grassy savannahs. Great amount of bats live here. You can find here over 300 kinds of birds, among which there are many parrots, flamingoes and hummingbirds. Over 700 kinds of fish and other sea animals live in the nearby waters of Cuba.

The capital of Cuba is Havana. It is its political and cultural centre. Over 2.5 million people live in the city. Havana is full of interesting places to visit. You can find museums, old castles and churches here.

Cuba is well known for its comfortable hotels and beautiful beaches. There are many places to swim and to have a rest on a hot and sunny day.

Eurasia.

1.Geographical Position.

Eurasia is the largest continent in the world. It consists of two parts of the world Europe and Asia and occupies 1/3 of the dry land. The total area of the continent is 54.4 million sq km. The average height over the sea level is 830 m. There are four extreme points in Eurasia. They are:

North – cape Chelyuskin;

South – cape Piai;

East – cape Dezhnev;

West – cape Roca.

Eurasia is washed by all the oceans and has the largest number of the washing seas. It is washed by many seas. They are the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea, the Baltic Sea, the Barents Sea, the Kara Sea, the Laptev Sea, the East-Siberian Sea, the Bering Sea, the Chukot Sea, the Okhotsk Sea, the Japan Sea, the Yellow Sea, the East-China Sea, the South-China Sea, the Arabian Sea, the Red Sea, the Norwegian Sea, the Aegean Sea, the Adriatic Sea, the Tyrrhenian Sea, the Ionic Sea.

The coastlines of the continent are broken especially the western part, its length without islands is 100 thousand km. There are some bays and many peninsulas. We can see the Bay of Biscay, the Persian Bay and the Bay of Bengal. The peninsulas are Scandinavian, Pyrenean, Apennine, Balkan, Arabian, Hindustan, Indochina, Korea, Kamchatka and Malacca.

There are many islands around Eurasia. They are Sakhalin, Kalimantan, Spitsbergen, Java, Sumatra, New Land, North Land, Ireland, Island, Great Britain, Sri-Lanka, the Philippine Islands, the Japanese Islands.

Eurasia has many unique objects. Among them there is the highest point of the world - Chomolungma (Everest) which is 8 848 m high. The deepest place in the world - the Dead Sea (400m below sea level) is also here. The coldest place in the world is Oimyakon and the hottest place is the Mesopotamian Lowland. The wettest place in the world is the basin of the Brahmaputra River and the driest place is the Arabian Peninsula.

2.Relief.

There are two forms of relief in Eurasia: plains and mountains. Plains are the East- European Plain, the West-Siberian Plain, the Central Siberian Plain, the Great Plain of China, the Indo-Gangetic Plain, the Mesopotamian Lowland, the Deccan Highlands, and the Precaspian Lowland.

Eurasia has many mountains of different age. The mountains of young age are the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Apennines, the Carpathians, the Caucasus, the Plateau of Iran, the Hindu-Kush, the Pamir, the Himalayas, the Tibet, the Kunlun-Shan. The highest mountains of Europe are the Alps, of Asia – the Himalayas.

Old mountains of Eurasia are the Urals, the Scandinavian Mountains, the Altai, and the Tien-Shan. There are also some active volcanoes in the continent. The highest of them is Klyuchevskaya (4 750 m). The others are Krakatau, Fujiyama, Vesuvius and Etna.

Eurasia is rich in copper, tin, lead, zinc, precious stones, iron ore, uranium, gold, aluminum, coal and salt. Great deposits of natural gas and oil are also here.