Portal:World

The World Portal

The world 

---

The Blue Marble, a photograph of the planet Earth made on 7 December 1972 by the crew of the Apollo 17 spacecraft.

The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that is. 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 "[t]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 or 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...)

Selected articles -

• 
  The BWF World Tour is a Grade 2 badminton tournament series, sanctioned by Badminton World Federation (BWF). It is a competition open to the top world ranked players in singles (men's and women's) and doubles (men's, women's and mixed). The competition was announced on 19 March 2017 and came into effect starting from 2018, replacing the BWF Super Series, which was held from 2007 to 2017.
  
  The BWF World Tour are divided into six levels, namely World Tour Finals, Super 1000, Super 750, Super 500, and Super 300 in order (part of the HSBC World Tour). One other category of tournament, the BWF Tour Super 100 level, also offers ranking points. (Full article...)
• 

  

  Distribution by country

  
  UNESCO established its Lists of Intangible Cultural Heritage with the aim of ensuring better protection of important intangible cultural heritages worldwide and the awareness of their significance. This list is published by the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage, the members of which are elected by State Parties meeting in a General Assembly. Through a compendium of the different oral and intangible treasures of humankind worldwide, the programme aims to draw attention to the importance of safeguarding intangible heritage, which UNESCO has identified as an essential component and as a repository of cultural diversity and of creative expression.
  
  The list was established in 2008 when the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage took effect. (Full article...)
• 
  The global digital divide describes global disparities, primarily between developed and developing countries, in regards to access to computing and information resources such as the Internet and the opportunities derived from such access.
  
  The Internet is expanding very quickly, and not all countries—especially developing countries—can keep up with the constant changes. The term "digital divide" does not necessarily mean that someone does not have technology; it could mean that there is simply a difference in technology. These differences can refer to, for example, high-quality computers, fast Internet, technical assistance, or telephone services. (Full article...)
• 
  A world-system is a socioeconomic system, under systems theory, that encompasses part or all of the globe, detailing the aggregate structural result of the sum of the interactions between polities. World-systems are usually larger than single states, but do not have to be global. The Westphalian System is the preeminent world-system operating in the contemporary world, denoting the system of sovereign states and nation-states produced by the Westphalian Treaties in 1648. Several world-systems can coexist, provided that they have little or no interaction with one another. Where such interactions becomes significant, separate world-systems merge into a new, larger world-system. Through the process of globalization, the modern world has reached the state of one dominant world-system, but in human history there have been periods where separate world-systems existed simultaneously, according to Janet Abu-Lughod. The most well-known version of the world-system approach has been developed by Immanuel Wallerstein. A world-system is a crucial element of the world-system theory, a multidisciplinary, macro-scale approach to world history and social change. (Full article...)
• 
  Nuclear proliferation is the spread of nuclear weapons, fissionable material, and weapons-applicable nuclear technology and information to nations not recognized as "Nuclear Weapon States" by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonly known as the Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT. Proliferation has been opposed by many nations with and without nuclear weapons, as governments fear that more countries with nuclear weapons will increase the possibility of nuclear warfare (up to and including the so-called countervalue targeting of civilians with nuclear weapons), de-stabilize international or regional relations, or infringe upon the national sovereignty of nation states.
  
  Four countries besides the five recognized Nuclear Weapon States have acquired, or are presumed to have acquired, nuclear weapons: India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel. None of these four are a party to the NPT, although North Korea acceded to the NPT in 1985, then withdrew in 2003 and conducted its first nuclear test in 2006. One critique of the NPT is that the treaty is discriminatory in the sense that only those countries that tested nuclear weapons before 1968 are recognized as nuclear weapon states while all other states are treated as non-nuclear-weapon states who can only join the treaty if they forswear nuclear weapons. (Full article...)
• 
  End time, End times, or Endtime may refer to: (Full article...)
• 

  

  The supercontinent Pangaea in the early Mesozoic (at 200 Ma)

  
  
  Pangaea or Pangea (/pænˈdʒiː.ə/) was a supercontinent that existed during the late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic eras. It assembled from the earlier continental units of Gondwana, Euramerica and Siberia during the Carboniferous approximately 335 million years ago, and began to break apart about 200 million years ago, at the end of the Triassic and beginning of the Jurassic. In contrast to the present Earth and its distribution of continental mass, Pangaea was centred on the equator and surrounded by the superocean Panthalassa and the Paleo-Tethys and subsequent Tethys Oceans. Pangaea is the most recent supercontinent to have existed and the first to be reconstructed by geologists. (Full article...)

General images -

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

• 

  Taj Mahal, Mughal Empire, India

• 

  Relief of Earth's crust (from Earth)

• 

  Hagia Sophia, in Istanbul – a symbol of Byzantine civilization

• 

  An 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 close than today, appearing 2.8 times larger and producing strong tides. (from Earth)

• 

  China urbanized rapidly in the 21st century (pictured: Shanghai).

• 

  Chennakesava Temple, Belur, India

• 

  Crusader Krak des Chevaliers, Syria

• 

  An artist's impression of ice age Earth at glacial maximum. (from History of Earth)

• 

  Conjectured illustration of the scorched Earth after the Sun has entered the red giant phase, about 5–7 billion years from now (from Earth)

• 

  Maya observatory, Chichen Itza, Mexico

• 

  Olmec colossal head, La Venta

• 

  Pillar erected by India's Maurya Emperor Ashoka

• 

  The 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)

• 

  Japanese depiction of Portuguese trading carrack. Shipbuilding advances in Late Middle Ages led to global European presence in the early modern period.

• 

  Geologic 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.

• 

  Pale orange dot, an artist's impression of Early Earth, featuring its tinted orange methane-rich early atmosphere (from Earth)

• 

  Cuneiform inscription, Sumer, Mesopotamia, 26th century BCE

• 

  Chloroplasts in the cells of a moss (from History of Earth)

• 

  World population, from 10,000 BCE to 2000 CE, with projection to 2100 CE (from Human history)

• 

  Pangaea 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)

• 

  Angkor Wat temple complex, Cambodia, early 12th century

• 

  Fall of Berlin Wall, 1989 (Brandenburg Gate in background)

• 

  An 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)

• 

  Earth's atmosphere as it appears from space, as bands of different colours at the horizon. From the bottom, afterglow illuminates the troposphere in orange with silhouettes of clouds, and the stratosphere in white and blue. Next the mesosphere (pink area) extends to just below the edge of space at one hundred kilometers and the pink line of airglow of the lower thermosphere (invisible), which hosts green and red aurorae over several hundred kilometers. (from Earth)

• 

  A 2012 artistic impression of the early Solar System's protoplanetary disk from which Earth and other Solar System bodies were formed (from Earth)

• 

  University of Timbuktu, Mali

• 

  Image of the physical world, captured by the Hubble Space Telescope (from World)

• 

  A Benin Bronze head from Nigeria

• 

  A computer-generated image mapping the prevalence of artificial satellites and space debris around Earth in geosynchronous and low Earth orbit (from Earth)

• 

  Trilobites first appeared during the Cambrian period and were among the most widespread and diverse groups of Paleozoic organisms. (from History of Earth)

• 

  An artist's rendering of a protoplanetary disk (from History of Earth)

• 

  A 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)

• 

  Battle during 1281 Mongol invasion of Japan

• 

  Florence, birthplace of the Italian Renaissance

• 

  Artist's impression of the enormous collision that probably formed the Moon (from History of Earth)

• 

  Last Moon landing: Apollo 17 (1972)

• 

  Map of peopling of the world (Southern Dispersal paradigm), in thousands of years ago.

• 

  World War I trench warfare

• 

  Moai, Rapa Nui (Easter Island)

• 

  Earth and the Moon as seen from Mars in an image taken by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on 22 April 2022 (from Earth)

• 

  Lithified 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)

• 

  Artist's conception of Hadean Eon Earth, when it was much hotter and inhospitable to all forms of life. (from History of Earth)

• 

  A 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)

• 

  A 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)

• 

  Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci epitomizes the advances in art and science seen during the Renaissance. (from History of Earth)

• 

  Astronaut Buzz Aldrin on the Moon, photographed by Neil Armstrong, 1969 (from History of Earth)

• 

  Cross-section through a liposome (from History of Earth)

• 

  A composite image of artificial light emissions at night on a map of Earth (from Earth)

• 

  A schematic view of Earth's magnetosphere with solar wind flowing from left to right (from Earth)

• 

  Tracy Caldwell Dyson, a NASA astronaut, observing Earth from the Cupola module at the International Space Station on 11 September 2010 (from Earth)

• 

  A 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)

• 

  Pantheon, Rome, originally a temple, now a Catholic church

• 

  Yggdrasil, an attempt to reconstruct the Norse world tree which connects the heavens, the world, and the underworld. (from World)

• 

  Graph showing range of estimated partial pressure of atmospheric oxygen through geologic time (from History of Earth)

• 

  Standing Buddha from Gandhara, 2nd century CE

• 

  World history chart depicting state formation over time (from Human history)

• 

  Artist's conception of Devonian flora (from History of Earth)

• 

  Dinosaurs were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates throughout most of the Mesozoic (from History of Earth)

• 

  Venus figurine, Germany, c. 37,500 BCE

• 

  Obelisk of Axum, Ethiopia

• 

  St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City

• 

  Artist'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)

• 

  A reconstruction of Pannotia (550 Ma). (from History of Earth)

• 

  Satellite time lapse imagery of Earth's rotation showing axis tilt (from Earth)

• 

  A pillar at Göbekli Tepe

• 

  Atomic bombings: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, 1945

• 

  Artist'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)

• 

  The 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)

• 

  Change in average surface air temperature and drivers for that change. Human activity has caused increased temperatures, with natural forces adding some variability. (from Earth)

• 

  A map of heat flow from Earth's interior to the surface of Earth's crust, mostly along the oceanic ridges (from Earth)

• 

  Earth's axial tilt causing different angles of seasonal illumination at different orbital positions around the Sun (from Earth)

• 

  Machu Picchu, Inca Empire, Peru

• 

  James Watt's steam engine powered the Industrial Revolution.

• 

  Artist's rendition of an oxinated fully-frozen Snowball Earth with no remaining liquid surface water. (from History of Earth)

• 

  Cave paintings, Lascaux, France, c. 15,000 BCE

• 
  Earth's major plates, which are:

  •   Pacific Plate
  •   African Plate
  •   North American Plate
  •   Eurasian Plate
  •   Antarctic Plate
  •   Indo-Australian Plate
  •   South American Plate

  (from Earth)
• 

  Great Pyramids of Giza, Egypt

• 

  Tiktaalik, a fish with limb-like fins and a predecessor of tetrapods. Reconstruction from fossils about 375 million years old. (from History of Earth)

• 

  A 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)

• 

  Exaggerated 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)

• 

  Earth's land use for human agriculture (from Earth)

• 

  First airplane, the Wright Flyer, flew on 17 December 1903.

• 

  A reconstruction of human history based on fossil data. (from History of Earth)

• 

  "Lucy", the first Australopithecus afarensis skeleton found. Lucy was only 1.06 m (3 ft 6 in) tall.

• 

  Earth's western hemisphere showing topography relative to Earth's center instead of to mean sea level, as in common topographic maps (from Earth)

• 

  Earth's history with time-spans of the eons to scale (from History of Earth)

• 

  Persepolis, Achaemenid Empire, 6th century BCE

• 

  Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris.

• 

  Great Mosque of Kairouan, Tunisia, founded 670 CE

• 

  Ming dynasty section, Great Wall of China

• 

  Empires of the world in 1898

Megacities of the world -

Badshahi Mosque

Lahore (/ləˈhɔːr/ lə-HOR; Punjabi: لہور [ˈlɔ̀ːɾə̆]; Urdu: لاہور [laːˈɦɔːɾ] ^ⓘ) is the capital and largest city of the Pakistani province of Punjab. It is the second largest city in Pakistan, after Karachi, and 26th largest in the world, with a population of over 13 million. It is located in the north-eastern region of Punjab, along the River Ravi. Lahore is one of Pakistan's major industrial and economic hubs. It has been the historic capital and cultural centre of the wider Punjab region, and is one of Pakistan's most socially liberal, progressive, and cosmopolitan cities.

Lahore's origins reach into antiquity. The city has been inhabited for around two millennia, although it rose to prominence in the late 10th century. Lahore was the capital of several empires during medieval era, including the Hindu Shahis, Ghaznavids, and Delhi Sultanate. It reached the height of its splendor under the Mughal Empire between the late 16th and early 18th century and also served as its capital city for many years. During this period, it was one of the largest cities in the medieval world. The city was captured by the forces of the Afsharid ruler Nader Shah in 1739. Although the Mughal authority was re-established, it fell into a period of decay while being contested among the Afghans and the Sikhs between 1748 and 1798. Lahore eventually became the capital of the Sikh Empire in the early 19th century, regaining some of its lost grandeur. Lahore was annexed to the British Raj in 1849 and became the capital of British Punjab. Lahore was central to the independence movements of both India and Pakistan, with the city being the site of both the declaration of Indian Independence and the resolution calling for the establishment of Pakistan. It experienced some of the worst riotings during the Partition period preceding Pakistan's independence. Following the success of the Pakistan Movement and the subsequent partition of British India in 1947, Lahore was declared the capital of Pakistan's Punjab province. (Full article...)

Did you know -

• ... that The Constellation of Leo, a group portrait of people from Italy's art world, was exhibited with a note that read "not without a trace of irony"?
• ... that the 51st Defense Battalion, formed during World War II, was the first African-American unit in the United States Marine Corps?
• ... that Ben Purse was a leader of the 1920 blind march, which helped bring about the world's first disability-specific legislation?
• ... that Turkish world- and European-champion armwrestler Esra Kiraz used to carry cement bags at construction sites where her father worked?
• ... that in 2020, Jasmin Taylor broke the record for the most medals won by a British skier at the World Cup and World Championships?
• ... that respected travelling bandleader Otto Schwarz and his Bavarian String Band were interned in Douglas, Isle of Man, during World War I?
• ... that during the Second World War, the British government's campaign Make-Do and Mend encouraged the public to fashion men's clothes into womenswear?
• ... the Tala tank is the largest overhead water reservoir in the world?

Countries of the world -

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (/ˌɡrɛnəˈdiːnz/ ^ⓘ GREH-nə-DEENZ) is an island country in the eastern Caribbean. It is located in the southeast Windward Islands of the Lesser Antilles, which lie in the West Indies, at the southern end of the eastern border of the Caribbean Sea, where the latter meets the Atlantic Ocean.

Its 369 km² (142 sq mi) territory consists of the main island of Saint Vincent and, south of that, two-thirds of the northern part of the Grenadines, a chain of 32 smaller islands. Some of the Grenadines are inhabited—Bequia, Mustique, Union Island, Canouan, Petit Saint Vincent, Palm Island, Mayreau, Young Island—while others are not: Tobago Cays, Baliceaux, Battowia, Quatre, Petite Mustique, Savan and Petit Nevis. Most of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines lies within the Hurricane Alley. (Full article...)

Wonders of the World -

Eighth Wonder of the World is an unofficial title sometimes given to new buildings, structures, projects, designs or even people that are deemed to be comparable to the seven Wonders of the World. (Full article...)

Related portals

---

Protected areas of the world -

• 
  The Protected areas of New South Wales include both terrestrial and marine protected areas. there are 225 national parks in New South Wales. A number established since the late 1970s followed campaigns by local residents and environmentalists.
  
  Based on the Collaborative Australian Protected Area Database (CAPAD) 2020 data there are 2136 separate terrestrial protected areas with a total land area of 7,696,641 hectares (19,018,810 acres) (9.61% of the state's area). CAPAD data also shows 18 marine protected areas with a total area of 348,849 hectares (862,020 acres), covering 39.63% of NSW waters. (Full article...)
• 

  

  Cranes at Sevan National Park

  
  This is a list of protected areas in Armenia that are categorized as follows: 4 national parks, 3 state reserves, 27 state sanctuaries and 5 botanical gardens. (Full article...)
• 
  Protected areas of West Bengal cover 4% of the state area. Forests make up 14% of the geographical area of West Bengal, which is lower than the national average of 33%. West Bengal has a wide variety of fauna, including Bengal tigers, Indian leopards, sloth and Himalayan black bears, chital and sambar (deer), Indian boars, pygmy hogs, Indian elephants, Indian peafowl, great Indian hornbills, Eurasian spoonbills, brahminy ducks, king and Indian cobras, white-lipped pit viper, Indian and reticulated pythons, mugger crocodiles, saltwater crocodiles, gharials, and many more. A huge montane forest, Dooars, is situated in the Northern West Bengal districts of Alipur Duar, Darjeeling, and Kalimpong. Part of the world's largest mangrove forest, Sundarbans, is located in southern West Bengal.
  There are 6 national parks and 15 wildlife sanctuaries in West Bengal. (Full article...)
• 
  The National Parks of Argentina make up a network of 35 national parks in Argentina. The parks cover a very varied set of terrains and biotopes, from Baritú National Park on the northern border with Bolivia to Tierra del Fuego National Park in the far south of the continent. The Administración de Parques Nacionales (National Parks Administration) is the agency that preserves and manages these national parks along with Natural monuments and National Reserves within the country.
  
  The headquarters of the National Parks Service are in downtown Buenos Aires, on Santa Fe Avenue. A library and information centre are open to the public. The administration also covers the national monuments, such as the Jaramillo Petrified Forest, and natural and educational reserves. (Full article...)
• 
  This is a list of protected areas in Belize. (Full article...)
• 

  

  The Valley of the Giants skywalk at Walpole-Nornalup National Park

  
  Western Australia is the second largest country subdivision in the world.
  
  As of 2022, based on the latest Collaborative Australian Protected Areas Database report, it contains 1857 separate land-based protected areas with a total area of 76,142,710 hectares (188,152,700 acres), accounting for just over 30 percent of the state's land mass. By area, Indigenous Protected Areas account for the largest part of this, almost 67 percent while, by number, nature reserves hold the majority with two-third of all land-based protected areas being nature reserves. (Full article...)
• 
  National parks of Victoria State parks of Victoria Marine national parks of Victoria Marine and coastal parks of Victoria Marine sanctuaries of Victoria Other parks of Victoria

(Full article...)

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

This is a list of protected areas of Nunavut. (Full article...)

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...)

This list of protected areas of Manitoba groups the protected areas of Manitoba by the agency that is responsible for their protection. (Full article...)

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...)

Bonampak is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the Mexican state of Chiapas, and is a natural monument.

There are currently 182 Protected Natural Areas in Mexico, covering 25.4 million hectares in total. They are protected and administered by the National Commission of Protected Natural Areas (Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas, or 'CONANP'), a federal agency. CONANP administers:

• 67 Mexican National Parks
• 44 biosphere reserves
• 40 flora and fauna protection areas
• 18 Mexican Nature Sanctuaries
• 9 natural resources protection areas
• 11 natural monuments

(Full article...)

The northernmost tip of Prins Karls Forland in Forlandet National Park

Svalbard is an Arctic wilderness archipelago comprising the northernmost part of Norway. There are twenty-nine protected natural areas, consisting of seven national parks, six nature reserves, fifteen bird sanctuaries and one geotope protected area. In addition, human traces dating from before 1946 are automatically protected. The protected areas make up 39,800 square kilometers (15,400 sq mi) or 65% of the land area, and 78,000 square kilometers (30,000 sq mi) or 86.5% of the territorial waters. The largest protected areas are Nordaust-Svalbard Nature Reserve and Søraust-Svalbard Nature Reserve, which cover most of the areas east of the main island of Spitsbergen, including the islands of Nordaustlandet, Edgeøya, Barentsøya, Kong Karls Land and Kvitøya. Six of the national parks are located on Spitsbergen. Ten of the bird sanctuaries and the Moffen Nature Reserve are located within national parks. Five of the bird sanctuaries are Ramsar sites and fourteen of the bird sanctuaries are islands. Svalbard is on Norway's tentative list for nomination as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The supreme responsibility for conservation lies with the Norwegian Ministry of the Environment, which has delegated the management to the Governor of Svalbard and the Norwegian Directorate for Nature Management. The foundation for conservation was established in the Svalbard Treaty of 1920, and has been further specified in the Svalbard Environmental Act of 2001. The first round of protection took force on 1 July 1973, when most of the current protected areas came into effect. This included the two large nature reserves and three of the national parks. Moffen Nature Reserve was established in 1983, followed by four national parks, three nature reserves and one geotope protection area between 2002 and 2005. (Full article...)

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...)

This is a list of protected areas of Romania.

About 5.18% of the area of Romania has a protected status (12,360 km²), including the Danube Delta, which makes half of these areas (2.43% of Romania's area). (Full article...)

Selected world maps

• 

  Only 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

• 

  Mollweide projection of the world

• 

  A plate tectonics map with volcano locations indicated with red circles

• 

  Index map from the International Map of the World (1:1,000,000 scale)

• 

  Time zones of the world

• 

  United Nations Human Development Index map by country (2016)

• 

  1516 map of the world by Martin Waldseemüller

• 

  The world map by Gerardus Mercator (1569), the first map in the well-known Mercator projection

• 

  The Goode homolosine projection is a pseudocylindrical, equal-area, composite map projection used for world maps.

World records

• List of Olympic records in athletics
• List of world records in athletics
• List of junior world records in athletics
• List of world records in masters athletics
• List of world youth bests in athletics
• List of IPC world records in athletics
• List of world records in canoeing
• List of world records in chess
• List of cycling records
• List of world records in track cycling
• List of world records in finswimming
• List of world records in juggling
• List of world records in rowing
• List of world records in speed skating
• List of world records in swimming
• List of IPC world records in swimming
• List of world records in Olympic weightlifting

Topics

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

Categories

Category puzzle

Select [►] to view subcategories

World

Administrative divisions

International broadcasting

Continents

Cosmopolitan species

Countries

Global culture

World economy

Global natural environment

Geography

Global governance

Global surveillance

Globalization

Global health

World history

International aircraft

International classification systems

Global issues

World maps

International organizations

Global politics

World population

World records

Regions

International sports

Global studies

World systems theory

World Wars

---

World history

World historians

Geopolitical rivalry

History of globalization

History of international relations

Theories of history

Wikimedia

The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:

• 

  Commons
  Free media repository

• 

  Wikibooks
  Free textbooks and manuals

• 

  Wikidata
  Free knowledge base

• 

  Wikinews
  Free-content news

• 

  Wikiquote
  Collection of quotations

• 

  Wikisource
  Free-content library

• 

  Wikispecies
  Directory of species

• 

  Wikiversity
  Free learning tools

• 

  Wikivoyage
  Free travel guide

• 

  Wiktionary
  Dictionary and thesaurus

More portals

Discover Wikipedia using portals

• 

  List of all portals

  List of all portals

• 

  The arts portal

  The arts portal

• 

  Biography portal

  Biography portal

• 

  Current events portal

  Current events portal

• 

  Geography portal

  Geography portal

• 

  History portal

  History portal

• 

  Mathematics portal

  Mathematics portal

• 

  Science portal

  Science portal

• 

  Society portal

  Society portal

• 

  Technology portal

  Technology portal

• 

  Random portal

  Random portal

• 

  WikiProject Portals

  WikiProject Portals