Portal:World

The World Portal

The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique while others talk of a "plurality of worlds". Some treat the world as one simple object while others analyze the world as a complex made up of parts.

In scientific cosmology, the world or universe is commonly defined as "he totality of all space and time; all that is, has been, and will be". Theories of modality talk of possible worlds as complete and consistent ways how things could have been. Phenomenology, starting from the horizon of co-given objects present in the periphery of every experience, defines the world as the biggest horizon or the "horizon of all horizons". In philosophy of mind, the world is contrasted with the mind as that which is represented by the mind. Theology conceptualizes the world in relation to God, for example, as God's creation, as identical to God or as the two being interdependent. In religions, there is a tendency to downgrade the material or sensory world in favor of a spiritual world to be sought through religious practice. A comprehensive representation of the world and our place in it, as is found in religions, is known as a worldview. Cosmogony is the field that studies the origin or creation of the world while eschatology refers to the science or doctrine of the last things or of the end of the world.

In various contexts, the term "world" takes a more restricted meaning associated, for example, with the Earth and all life on it, with humanity as a whole or with an international or intercontinental scope. In this sense, world history refers to the history of humanity as a whole and world politics is the discipline of political science studying issues that transcend nations and continents. Other examples include terms such as "world religion", "world language", "world government", "world war", "world population", "world economy", or "world championship". (Full article...)

Refresh with new selections below (purge)

Selected articles - show another

Image 1
The reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States (1776). The Latin phrase novus ordo seclorum, appearing on the reverse side of the Great Seal since 1782 and on the back of the U.S. one-dollar bill since 1935, translates to "New Order of the Ages", and alludes to the beginning of an era where the United States of America is an independent nation-state; conspiracy theorists claim this is an allusion to the "New World Order".

The New World Order (NWO) is a term used in several conspiracy theories which hypothesize a secretly emerging totalitarian world government. The common theme in conspiracy theories about a New World Order is that a secretive power elite with a globalist agenda is conspiring to eventually achieve world domination and rule the world through an authoritarian one-world government—which will replace sovereign nation-states—and an all-encompassing propaganda whose ideology hails the establishment of the New World Order as the culmination of history's progress. Many influential historical and contemporary figures have therefore been alleged to be part of a cabal that operates through many front organizations to orchestrate significant political and financial events, ranging from causing systemic crises to pushing through controversial policies, at both national and international levels, as steps in an ongoing plot to achieve world domination.

Before the early 1990s, New World Order conspiracism was limited to two American countercultures, primarily the militantly anti-government right, and secondarily the part of fundamentalist Christianity concerned with the eschatological end-time emergence of the Antichrist. Academics who study conspiracy theories and religious extremism, such as Michael Barkun and Chip Berlet, observed that right-wing populist conspiracy theories about a New World Order not only had been embraced by many seekers of stigmatized knowledge but also had seeped into popular culture, thereby fueling a surge of interest and participation in survivalism and paramilitarism as many people actively prepare for apocalyptic and millenarian scenarios. These political scientists warn that mass hysteria over New World Order conspiracy theories could eventually have devastating effects on American political life, ranging from escalating lone-wolf terrorism to the rise to power of authoritarian ultranationalist demagogues. (Full article...)
Image 2

Commissioner's Trophy

The World Series is the annual final championship series of Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada. It has traditionally been held in October, though some more recent editions were contested in November due to expanded playoffs and/or season delays. It has been contested since 1903 between the champion teams of the American League (AL) and the National League (NL). The winner of the World Series championship is determined through a best-of-seven playoff, and the winning team is awarded the Commissioner's Trophy.

Prior to the AL and NL being split into divisions in 1969, the team with the best regular-season win–loss record in each league automatically clinched its league's pennant and advanced to the World Series, barring the rare tie necessitating a pennant playoff. Since then each league has conducted a League Championship Series (ALCS and NLCS) preceding the World Series to determine which teams will advance, while those series have been preceded in turn by Division Series (ALDS and NLDS) since 1995, and Wild Card games or series in each league since 2012. Until 2002, home-field advantage in the World Series alternated from year to year between the AL and NL. From 2003 to 2016, home-field advantage was given to the league that won that year's All-Star Game. Starting in 2017, home-field advantage was awarded to the league champion team with the better regular-season win–loss record, regardless of that team's seeding in earlier playoff rounds (i.e. a Wild Card team in one league will have home-field advantage over a division winner in the other league if the WC team had a better record or wins the tie-breaking procedure). (Full article...)
Image 3
Ding Liren of China, the current world champion (2023)

The World Chess Championship is played to determine the world champion in chess. The current world champion is Ding Liren, who defeated his opponent Ian Nepomniachtchi in the 2023 World Chess Championship. Magnus Carlsen, the previous world champion, had declined to defend his title.

The first event recognized as a world championship was the 1886 match between the two leading players in the world, Wilhelm Steinitz and Johannes Zukertort. Steinitz won, becoming the first world champion. From 1886 to 1946, the champion set the terms, requiring any challenger to raise a sizable stake and defeat the champion in a match in order to become the new world champion. Following the death of reigning world champion Alexander Alekhine in 1946, FIDE (the International Chess Federation) took over administration of the World Championship, beginning with the 1948 World Championship tournament. From 1948 to 1993, FIDE organized a set of tournaments to choose a new challenger every three years. In 1993, reigning champion Garry Kasparov broke away from FIDE, which led to a rival claimant to the title of World Champion for the next thirteen years. The titles were unified at the World Chess Championship 2006, and all subsequent matches have once again been administered by FIDE. (Full article...)
Image 4

Miss Universe is an annual international major beauty pageant that is run by a United States and Thailand-based Miss Universe Organization. Along with Miss World, Miss International, and Miss Earth, it is one of the Big Four beauty pageants.

The Miss Universe Organization and its brand, along with its sister pageants, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA, is currently owned by JKN Global Group and Legacy Holding Group USA Inc., an American division of Mexican company Legacy Holding through the joint venture company JKN Legacy Inc. Telemundo has the licensing rights to air the pageant through 2023. The pageant's advocacy is "humanitarian issues and is a voice to affect positive change in the world." (Full article...)
Image 5
Map of global water stress (a symptom of water scarcity) in 2019. Water stress is the ratio of water use relative to water availability and is therefore a demand-driven scarcity.

Water scarcity (closely related to water stress or water crisis) is the lack of fresh water resources to meet the standard water demand. There are two type of water scarcity. One is physical. The other is economic water scarcity. Physical water scarcity is where there is not enough water to meet all demands. This includes water needed for ecosystems to function. Regions with a desert climate often face physical water scarcity. Central Asia, West Asia, and North Africa are examples of arid areas. Economic water scarcity results from a lack of investment in infrastructure or technology to draw water from rivers, aquifers, or other water sources. It also results from weak human capacity to meet water demand. Many people in Sub-Saharan Africa are living with economic water scarcity.

There is enough freshwater available globally and averaged over the year to meet demand. As such, water scarcity is caused by a mismatch between when and where people need water, and when and where it is available. One of the main causes of the increase in global water demand is the increase in the number of people. Others are the rise in living conditions, changing diets (to more animal products), and expansion of irrigated agriculture. Climate change (including droughts or floods), deforestation, water pollution and wasteful use of water can also mean there is not enough water. These variations in scarcity may also be a function of prevailing economic policy and planning approaches. (Full article...)
Image 6

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is an inventory of the global conservation status and extinction risk of biological species. A series of Regional Red Lists, which assess the risk of extinction to species within a political management unit, are also produced by countries and organizations.

The goals of the Red List are to provide scientifically based information on the status of species and subspecies at a global level, to draw attention to the magnitude and importance of threatened biodiversity, to influence national and international policy and decision-making, and to provide information to guide actions to conserve biological diversity. (Full article...)
Image 7
A free trade area is the region encompassing a trade bloc whose member countries have signed a free trade agreement (FTA). Such agreements involve cooperation between at least two countries to reduce trade barriers, import quotas and tariffs, and to increase trade of goods and services with each other. If natural persons are also free to move between the countries, in addition to a free trade agreement, it would also be considered an open border. It can be considered the second stage of economic integration.

Customs unions are a special type of free trade area. All such areas have internal arrangements which parties conclude in order to liberalize and facilitate trade among themselves. The crucial difference between customs unions and free trade areas is their approach to third parties. While a customs union requires all parties to establish and maintain identical external tariffs with regard to trade with non-parties, parties to a free trade area are not subject to this requirement. Instead, they may establish and maintain whatever tariff regime applying to imports from non-parties as deemed necessary. In a free trade area without harmonized external tariffs, to eliminate the risk of trade deflection, parties will adopt a system of preferential rules of origin. (Full article...)

List of selected articles

General images - load new batch

The following are images from various world-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Lithified stromatolites on the shores of Lake Thetis, Western Australia. Archean stromatolites are the first direct fossil traces of life on Earth. (from History of Earth)
Image 2Pale orange dot, an artist's impression of Early Earth, featuring its tinted orange methane-rich early atmosphere (from Earth)
Image 3Japanese depiction of a Portuguese carrack. European maritime innovations led to proto-globalization.
Image 4Earth's land use for human agriculture in 2019 (from Earth)
Image 5The replicator in virtually all known life is deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA is far more complex than the original replicator and its replication systems are highly elaborate. (from History of Earth)
Image 6Moai, Easter Island (from Human history)
Image 7Geologic map of North America, color-coded by age. From most recent to oldest, age is indicated by yellow, green, blue, and red. The reds and pinks indicate rock from the Archean.
Image 8Image of the physical world, captured by the Hubble Space Telescope (from World)
Image 9Florence, birthplace of the Italian Renaissance
Image 10St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City
Image 11A composite image of artificial light emissions at night on a map of Earth (from Earth)
Image 12"Lucy", the first Australopithecus afarensis skeleton found, was only 1.06 m (3 ft 6 in) tall.
Image 13Artist's impression of Earth during the later Archean, the largely cooled planetary crust and water-rich barren surface, marked by volcanoes and continents, features already round microbialites. The Moon, still orbiting Earth much closer than today and still dominating Earth's sky, produced strong tides. (from History of Earth)
Image 14Maya observatory, Chichen Itza, Mexico
Image 15Fall of the Berlin Wall, 1989
Image 16Dinosaurs were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates throughout most of the Mesozoic (from History of Earth)
Image 17A reconstruction of Pannotia (550 Ma). (from History of Earth)
Image 18A computer-generated image mapping the prevalence of artificial satellites and space debris around Earth in geosynchronous and low Earth orbit (from Earth)
Image 19Yggdrasil, an attempt to reconstruct the Norse world tree which connects the heavens, the world, and the underworld. (from World)
Image 20A view of Earth with its global ocean and cloud cover, which dominate Earth's surface and hydrosphere; at Earth's polar regions, its hydrosphere forms larger areas of ice cover. (from Earth)
Image 21Exaggerated illustration of Earth's elliptical orbit around the Sun, marking that the orbital extreme points (apoapsis and periapsis) are not the same as the four seasonal extreme points, the equinox and solstice (from Earth)
Image 22An artist's rendering of a protoplanetary disk (from History of Earth)
Image 23Pangaea was a supercontinent that existed from about 300 to 180 Ma. The outlines of the modern continents and other landmasses are indicated on this map. (from History of Earth)
Image 24A High Desert storm in the Mojave (from Earth)
Image 25The pale orange dot, an artist's impression of the early Earth which might have appeared orange through its hazy methane rich prebiotic second atmosphere. Earth's atmosphere at this stage was somewhat comparable to today's atmosphere of Titan. (from History of Earth)
Image 26Earth's axial tilt causing different angles of seasonal illumination at different orbital positions around the Sun (from Earth)
Image 27Chloroplasts in the cells of a moss (from History of Earth)
Image 28A reconstruction of human history based on fossil data. (from History of Earth)
Image 29Earth's major plates, which are:
(from Earth)
Image 30Notre-Dame de Paris, France
Image 31View of Earth from the Moon by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (from Earth)
Image 32Cross-section through a liposome (from History of Earth)
Image 33Angkor Wat temple complex, Cambodia, early 12th century
Image 34Great Pyramids of Giza, Egypt
Image 35Artist's impression of a Hadean landscape with the relatively newly formed Moon still looming closely over Earth and both bodies sustaining strong volcanism. (from History of Earth)
Image 36Chennakesava Temple, Belur, India
Image 37A view of Earth with different layers of its atmosphere visible: the troposphere with its clouds casting shadows, a band of stratospheric blue sky at the horizon, and a line of green airglow of the lower thermosphere around an altitude of 100 km, at the edge of space (from Earth)
Image 38Scientific worldview. (from World)
Image 39First airplane, the Wright Flyer, flew on 17 December 1903.
Image 40A 2012 artistic impression of the early Solar System's protoplanetary disk from which Earth and other Solar System bodies were formed (from Earth)
Image 41Peopling of the world, the Southern Dispersal scenario
Image 42Artist's rendition of an oxinated fully-frozen Snowball Earth with no remaining liquid surface water. (from History of Earth)
Image 43Ming dynasty section, Great Wall of China
Image 44Tiktaalik, a fish with limb-like fins and a predecessor of tetrapods. Reconstruction from fossils about 375 million years old. (from History of Earth)
Image 45James Watt's steam engine powered the Industrial Revolution.
Image 46Earth's history with time-spans of the eons to scale (from History of Earth)
Image 47Earth and the Moon as seen from Mars by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (from Earth)
Image 48Astronaut Buzz Aldrin on the Moon, photographed by Neil Armstrong, 1969 (from History of Earth)
Image 49An artist's impression of the Archean, the eon after Earth's formation, featuring round stromatolites, which are early oxygen-producing forms of life from billions of years ago. After the Late Heavy Bombardment, Earth's crust had cooled, its water-rich barren surface is marked by continents and volcanoes, with the Moon still orbiting Earth half as far as it is today, appearing 2.8 times larger and producing strong tides. (from Earth)
Image 50Change in average surface air temperature and drivers for that change. Human activity has caused increased temperatures, with natural forces adding some variability. (from Earth)
Image 51Wittenberg, birthplace of Protestantism (from Human history)
Image 52Great Mosque of Kairouan, Tunisia, founded 670 CE
Image 53A pillar at Göbekli Tepe
Image 54Shanghai. China urbanized rapidly in the 21st century.
Image 55Cuneiform inscription, Sumer, Mesopotamia, 26th century BCE
Image 56A 580 million year old fossil of Spriggina floundensi, an animal from the Ediacaran period. Such life forms could have been ancestors to the many new forms that originated in the Cambrian Explosion. (from History of Earth)
Image 57Satellite time lapse imagery of Earth's rotation showing axis tilt (from Earth)
Image 58Ajloun Castle, Jordan
Image 59Relief of Earth's crust (from Earth)
Image 60Hagia Sophia, Istanbul – a symbol of Byzantine civilization
Image 61Graph showing range of estimated partial pressure of atmospheric oxygen through geologic time (from History of Earth)
Image 62Obelisk of Axum, Ethiopia
Image 63Persepolis, Achaemenid Empire, 6th century BCE
Image 64Artist's impression of the enormous collision that probably formed the Moon (from History of Earth)
Image 65Earth's night-side upper atmosphere appearing from the bottom as bands of afterglow illuminating the troposphere in orange with silhouettes of clouds, and the stratosphere in white and blue. Next the mesosphere (pink area) extends to the orange and faintly green line of the lowest airglow, at about one hundred kilometers at the edge of space and the lower edge of the thermosphere (invisible). Continuing with green and red bands of aurorae stretching over several hundred kilometers. (from Earth)
Image 66Pillar erected by India's Maurya Emperor Ashoka
Image 67Empires of the world in 1898
Image 68Standing Buddha from Gandhara, 2nd century CE
Image 69An artist's impression of ice age Earth at glacial maximum. (from History of Earth)
Image 70Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci epitomizes the advances in art and science seen during the Renaissance. (from History of Earth)
Image 71A schematic view of Earth's magnetosphere with solar wind flowing from left to right (from Earth)
Image 72Tracy Caldwell Dyson, a NASA astronaut, observing Earth from the Cupola module at the International Space Station on 11 September 2010 (from Earth)
Image 73Atomic bombing of Nagasaki, 1945
Image 74Earth's western hemisphere showing topography relative to Earth's center instead of to mean sea level, as in common topographic maps (from Earth)
Image 75Conjectured illustration of the scorched Earth after the Sun has entered the red giant phase, about 5–7 billion years from now (from Earth)
Image 76An animation of the changing density of productive vegetation on land (low in brown; heavy in dark green) and phytoplankton at the ocean surface (low in purple; high in yellow) (from Earth)
Image 77Taj Mahal, Mughal Empire, India
Image 78Trilobites first appeared during the Cambrian period and were among the most widespread and diverse groups of Paleozoic organisms. (from History of Earth)
Image 79Last Moon landing: Apollo 17 (1972)
Image 80A composite image of Earth, with its different types of surface discernible: Earth's surface dominating Ocean (blue), Africa with lush (green) to dry (brown) land and Earth's polar ice in the form of Antarctic sea ice (grey) covering the Antarctic or Southern Ocean and the Antarctic ice sheet (white) covering Antarctica. (from Earth)
Image 81Battle during the 1281 Mongol invasion of Japan
Image 82A map of heat flow from Earth's interior to the surface of Earth's crust, mostly along the oceanic ridges (from Earth)
Image 83Artist's conception of Devonian flora (from History of Earth)
Image 84Olmec colossal head, now at the Museo de Antropología de Xalapa
Image 85Machu Picchu, Inca Empire, Peru
Image 86A banded iron formation from the 3.15 Ga Moodies Group, Barberton Greenstone Belt, South Africa. Red layers represent the times when oxygen was available; gray layers were formed in anoxic circumstances. (from History of Earth)
Image 87Artist's conception of Hadean Eon Earth, when it was much hotter and inhospitable to all forms of life. (from History of Earth)
Image 88Benin Bronze head from Nigeria

Megacities of the world - show another

Buildings along Binondo

Manila (/məˈnɪlə/ mə-NIL-ə; Filipino: Maynila, pronounced [majˈnilaʔ]), officially the City of Manila (Filipino: Lungsod ng Maynila, [luŋˈsod nɐŋ majˈnilaʔ]), is the capital and second-most-populous city of the Philippines. Located on the eastern shore of Manila Bay on the island of Luzon, it is classified as a highly urbanized city. As of 2019, it is the world's most densely populated city proper. It was the first chartered city in the country, and was designated as such by the Philippine Commission Act No. 183 on July 31, 1901. It became autonomous with the passage of Republic Act No. 409, "The Revised Charter of the City of Manila", on June 18, 1949. Manila is considered to be part of the world's original set of global cities because its commercial networks were the first to extend across the Pacific Ocean and connect Asia with the Spanish Americas through the galleon trade; when this was accomplished, it was the first time an uninterrupted chain of trade routes circling the planet had been established.

By 1258, a Tagalog-fortified polity called Maynila existed on the site of modern Manila. On June 24, 1571, after the defeat of the polity's last indigenous Rajah Sulayman in the Battle of Bangkusay, Spanish conquistador Miguel López de Legazpi began constructing the walled fortification Intramuros on the ruins of an older settlement from whose name the Spanish-and-English name Manila derives. Manila was used as the capital of the captaincy general of the Spanish East Indies, which included the Marianas, Guam and other islands, and was controlled and administered for the Spanish crown by Mexico City in the Viceroyalty of New Spain. (Full article...)

List of megacities
Bangalore Bangkok Beijing Bogotá Buenos Aires Cairo Chengdu Chennai Chongqing Delhi Dhaka Guangzhou Hangzhou Ho Chi Minh City Hyderabad Istanbul Istanbul Jakarta Karachi Keihanshin Kinshasa Kolkata Lagos Lahore Lima London Los Angeles Mexico City Moscow Mumbai Nagoya New York City Paris Rhine-Ruhr Rio de Janeiro São Paulo Seoul Shanghai Shenzhen Tehran Tianjin Tokyo Xiamen

Did you know - load new batch

... that the Detached Unit of the Polish Army is often described as the first Allied partisan unit of World War II?
... that the urban legend Herobrine was ranked on a Guinness World Records poll of the best video game villains, despite never existing?
... that Hanna Dmyterko was among 34 Ukrainian women who fought in World War I?
... that the Uganda Volunteer Reserve helped intern German nationals at the start of the First World War?
... that John Spencer won a World Snooker Championship on his first attempt in 1969?
... that Fred Provo was told he would have to have his arm amputated due to a wound sustained in World War II, but refused, recovered, and went on to play in the National Football League?
... that at a maximum standard length of roughly 2 cm (0.8 in), dwarf pufferfish are some of the smallest pufferfish in the world?
... that despite Jimmy Eat World running out of song ideas in pre-production, Rolling Stone called Futures their "finest album"?

Countries of the world - show another

Malawi (/məˈlɑːwi/; lit. 'flames' in Chichewa and Chitumbuka), officially the Republic of Malawi and formerly known as Nyasaland, is a landlocked country in Southeastern Africa. It is bordered by Zambia to the west, Tanzania to the north and northeast, and Mozambique to the east, south and southwest. Malawi spans over 118,484 km² (45,747 sq mi) and has an estimated population of 19,431,566 (as of January 2021). Malawi's capital and largest city is Lilongwe. Its second-largest is Blantyre, its third-largest is Mzuzu and its fourth-largest is its former capital, Zomba. It was the first capital city of Malawi before being changed to Lilongwe.

The part of Africa now known as Malawi was settled around the 10th century by migrating Bantu groups. Centuries later, in 1891, the area was colonised by the British as the British Central African Protectorate, and it was renamed as Nyasaland in 1907. In 1953, it became a protectorate within the semi-independent Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. The Federation was dissolved in 1963. In 1964, the protectorate was ended: Nyasaland became an independent country as a Commonwealth realm under Prime Minister Hastings Banda, and was renamed Malawi. Two years later, Banda became president by converting the country into a one-party presidential republic. Banda was declared President for life in 1971, and Malawi's next few decades of independence were characterized by Banda's highly repressive dictatorship. Following the introduction of a multiparty system in 1993, Banda was defeated in the 1994 general election. Today, Malawi has a democratic, multi-party republic headed by an elected president and has continued to experience peaceful transitions of power. According to the 2024 V-Dem Democracy indices Malawi is ranked 74th electoral democracy worldwide and 11th electoral democracy in Africa. The country's military, the Malawian Defence Force, includes an army, a navy, and an air wing. Malawi's foreign policy is pro-Western. It maintains positive diplomatic relations with most countries, and participates in several international organisations, including the United Nations, the Commonwealth of Nations, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), and the African Union (AU). (Full article...)

List of countries

See also: List of sovereign states

Wonders of the World - show another

The Seven Wonders of Wales (Welsh: Saith Rhyfeddod Cymru) is a traditional list of notable landmarks in north Wales, commemorated in an anonymously written rhyme:

The rhyme is usually supposed to have been written sometime in the late 18th or early 19th century by an English visitor to North Wales. The specific number of wonders may have varied over the years: the antiquary Daines Barrington, in a letter written in 1770, refers to Llangollen Bridge as one of the "five wonders of Wales, though like the seven wonders of Dauphiny, they turn out to be no wonders at all out of the Principality". (Full article...)

List of articles
Wonders of the World Seven Wonders of the Ancient World New7Wonders of the World Seven Wonders of Canada Seven Wonders of Colombia Seven Wonders of Poland Seven Wonders of Portugal Seven Wonders of Romania Seven Wonders of Russia Seven Wonders of Ukraine Seven Wonders of the Industrial World Seven Wonders of Portuguese Origin in the World 12 Treasures of Spain Eighth Wonder of the World

Related portals

Protected areas of the world - load new batch

Image 1

Protected areas in Tanzania (Hifahdi za Mali hai za Tanzania, in Swahili) are extremely varied, ranging from sea habitats over grasslands to the top of the Kilimanjaro, the tallest mountain in Africa. About a third of the country's total area is protected to a certain degree as a national park, game reserve, marine park, forest reserve or the like. 840 protected areas are spread across 7,330 km2 of ocean and 361,594 km2 of land in Tanzania. The coastal and marine areas are less protected than terrestrial ecosystems, which are given the highest level of protection. Tanzania is one of the world's major biodiversity hotspots thanks to its vast national parks, "the Eastern Arc" mountains, wetlands, coastal forests, marine, and freshwater systems as remarkable reservoirs of plant and animal species. A wide range of endemic species of birds, reptiles, snakes, amphibians, wild coffee variations, and the well-known African violet flower can also be found in Tanzania. (Full article...)
Image 2
Protected areas of Slovakia are areas that need protection because of their environmental, historical or cultural value to the nation. Protected areas in Slovakia are managed by institutions and organizations governed by the Ministry of the Environment.

Types of protected areas:
- National Park (Slovak: Národný park; abbr. NP)
- Protected Landscape Area (Chránená krajinná oblasť; CHKO)
- National Nature Reserve (Národná prírodná rezervácia; NPR)
- Nature Reserve (Prírodná rezervácia; PR)
- National Nature Monument (Národná prírodná pamiatka; NPP)
- Nature Monument (Prírodná pamiatka; PP)
- Protected Site (Chránený areál; CHA)
- Protected Landscape Element (Chránený krajinný prvok; CHKP)
- Protected Bird Area* (Chránené vtáčie územie; CHVÚ) *Technically Special Protection Area (SPA) under the EU Bird's Directive
- Protected Tree (Chránený strom; CHS)
(Full article...)
Image 3
Map of the Philippine archipelago

In the Philippines, Protected Areas are administered by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)'s Biodiversity Management Bureau under the National Integrated Protected Areas System (NIPAS) Act of 1992.

As of 2020, there are 244 Protected Areas in the Philippines covering a total area of about 7,760,000 hectares (19,200,000 acres) – 15.4% of the Philippines' total area. (Full article...)
Image 4
Viru bog in Lahemaa National Park

Protected areas in Estonia are national parks, nature reserves and landscape protection areas (nature parks).

Estonia has five national parks, 167 nature reserves and 152 landscape conservation areas. In addition, there are 116 (118) protected areas with an old (Soviet-era) protection regulation and 537 parks. In total, 18.1% of Estonia are protected nature areas, with Lääne County having the highest percentage (32%) and Põlva County the lowest percentage of protected areas, about 9%. (Full article...)
Image 5

Canada's National Parks and National Reserves by provinces and territories

This is a list of protected areas of Newfoundland and Labrador. (Full article...)
Image 6
Protected areas of Tasmania consist of protected areas located within Tasmania and its immediate onshore waters, including Macquarie Island. It includes areas of crown land (withheld land) managed by Tasmanian Government agencies as well as private reserves. As of 2016, 52% of Tasmania's land area has some form of reservation classification, the majority is managed by the Tasmania Parks & Wildlife Service (about 42% of total Tasmanian land area). Marine protected areas cover about 7.9% of state waters.

Within each classification of reserve there may be a variation of IUCN categories Australia is a signatory to the Convention of Biological Diversity and as such has obligations to report the status of its National Reserve System.IUCN provides on its website a prescription for activities consistent with the categorisation system. Changes made to the Nature Conservation Act 2002 in 2014 permit timber harvesting. These changes made in addition to the already established right to access minerals means that many of the IUCN categorisations assigned to individual reserves in Tasmania are no longer fit for purpose. In addition many reserves have had their reserve status downgraded from a class excluding timber harvesting and mineral extraction to ones where these activities are now permitted. This mis-application of the IUCN protected area categories needs to be remedied or the reserves protected land class under the Nature Conservation Act 2002 should be adjusted to reflect its currently assigned IUCN category. (Full article...)
Image 7
A view of Kaptai National Park

This is a list of protected areas of Bangladesh. Bangladesh is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 163 million people in an area of either 148,460 square kilometres (57,320 sq mi) or 147,570 square kilometres (56,980 sq mi), making it one of the most densely populated countries in the world. (Full article...)
Image 8
Rano Kau, Parque National Rapa Nui, Easter Island

The protected areas of Chile are areas that have natural beauty or significant historical value protected by the government of Chile. These protected areas cover over 140,000 km² (54,054 sq mi), which is 19% of the territory of Chile. The National System of Protected Wild Areas (SNASPE by its Spanish acronym) is regulated by law #18,362 passed in 1984, and administered by the National Forest Corporation (CONAF).

There are three types of territories:
(Full article...)
Image 9
A National Biodiversity Conservation Area (NBCA) is an environmentally protected area in Laos. There are all together 21 different NBCAs in Laos, protecting 29,775 square kilometers. Another 10 NBCAs have been proposed, many of them being treated by authorities as though they were already officially protected. (Full article...)
Image 10
Illinois has a variety of protected areas, including over 123 state-protected areas, dozens of federally protected areas, hundreds of county-level and municipal park areas. Illinois also contains sites designated as internationally important protected areas. These multiple levels of protection contribute to a statewide network of numerous recreation opportunities and conservation schemes, sometimes in a small area. For example, DeKalb County contains a 1,000-acre (4.0 km²) forest preserve system and a 1,500-acre (6.1 km²) state park (Shabbona Lake State Park); within DeKalb County, the DeKalb Park District in the City of DeKalb has a 700-acre (2.8 km²) park system. (Full article...)
Image 11
"Temple Gate" Rock formation at Alkhanay National Park

Protected areas of Russia, (official Russian title: Russian: Особо охраняемые природные территории, literally "Specially Protected Natural Areas"), is governed by the corresponding 1995 law of the Russian Federation. (Full article...)
Image 12
This is a list of protected areas of Saudi Arabia, some of which are managed by the Saudi Wildlife Authority.:
(Full article...)
Image 13
Bihar is a state in East India. It is bounded by Uttar Pradesh to the west, Nepal to the north, West Bengal to the east and Jharkhand to the south. About 7% of the state is protected forest area. (Full article...)
Image 14
There are four categories of protected areas in India, constituted under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972. Tiger reserves consist of areas under national parks and wildlife sanctuaries. There are 53 tiger reserves in India. the protected areas of India cover 173,629.52 square kilometres (67,038.73 sq mi), roughly 5.28% of the total geographical area of the country. (Full article...)
Image 15
Vegetation outside Goz Beïda

The wildlife of Chad is composed of its flora and fauna. Bush elephants, West African lions, buffalo, hippopotamuses, Kordofan giraffes, antelopes, African leopards, cheetahs, hyenas, and many species of snakes are found there, although most large carnivore populations have been drastically reduced since the early 20th century. Elephant poaching, particularly in the south of the country in areas such as Zakouma National Park, is a severe problem. (Full article...)

List of protected areas

Selected world maps

Image 1Index map from the International Map of the World (1:1,000,000 scale)
Image 21516 map of the world by Martin Waldseemüller
Image 3A plate tectonics map with volcano locations indicated with red circles
Image 4The world map by Gerardus Mercator (1569), the first map in the well-known Mercator projection
$Image 5Only a few of the largest large igneous provinces appear (coloured dark purple) on this geological map, which depicts crustal geologic provinces as seen in seismic refraction data$

Image 5Only a few of the largest large igneous provinces appear (coloured dark purple) on this geological map, which depicts crustal geologic provinces as seen in seismic refraction data
Image 6The Goode homolosine projection is a pseudocylindrical, equal-area, composite map projection used for world maps.
Image 7United Nations Human Development Index map by country (2016)
Image 8Mollweide projection of the world
Image 9Time zones of the world

See also: Clickable world map • List of map projections

World records

edit

v t e Earth
Continents	Africa Antarctica Asia Australia Europe North America South America
Oceans	Arctic Ocean Atlantic Ocean Indian Ocean Pacific Ocean Southern Ocean
Geology	Age of Earth Geology Earth science Erosion Extremes on Earth Future Geological history time scale Geologic record Geophysics Gravity History of Earth Magnetic field Plate tectonics Structure
Atmosphere	Atmosphere of Earth Climate Global warming Weather
Environment	Biome Biosphere Ecology Ecosystem Human impact on the environment Evolutionary history of life Nature
Cartography	Digital mapping Satellite imagery Virtual globe World map
Culture and society	List of sovereign states dependent territories In culture Earth Day World economy Etymology World history Time zones World
Planetary science	Earth's orbit Evolution of Solar System Geology of solar terrestrial planets Location in the Universe The Moon Solar System
Outline of Earth