For purposes of this project, "Asia" refers to the entire eastern half of the Eurasian landmass and the arc of offshore islands in the western Pacific. This vast expanse can be pictured as an area centered on China and consisting of four distinct sub-regions arrayed clockwise around it: Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan), Northeast Asia (including the Russian Far East, the Korean Peninsula, Japan, and Taiwan), Southeast Asia (including both its mainland and maritime components) and the islands of Oceania, and the South Asian sub-continent (including India and Pakistan, and bordered to the west by Afghanistan). Strategic Asia is thus defined in this program as including the following countries or political entities:

The database currently contains 75 "indicators" (such as GDP, population, and annual defense expenditures) for each country for each year since 1990. Indicators are divided into 10 broad thematic areas:

Economy

Gross Domestic Product (With PPP)
Gross domestic product with PPP is gross domestic product converted to international dollars using purchasing power parity (PPP) rates. (Gross domestic product (GDP) is the sum of gross value added by all resident producers plus product taxes not included in the value of the products. It is calculated without deductions for asset or natural resource depletion).

GDP Real Growth Rate
GDP Growth Rate is change in growth on an annual basis adjusted for inflation and expressed as a percentage.

Gross Domestic Product (constant)
Constant gross domestic product is the sum of gross value added by all resident producers plus product taxes not included in the value of the products converted from domestic currencies using 1995 official exchange rates. It is calculated without deductions for asset or natural resource depletion. (For a few countries where the official exchange rate does not reflect the rate effectively applied to actual foreign exchange transactions, an alternative conversion factor is used.)

Gross Domestic Product Per Capita (with PPP)
Gross domestic product with PPP per capita is gross domestic product converted to international dollars with purchasing power parity (PPP rates), divided by the country’s total population.

Agriculture (share of GDP)
Agricultural output shows the percentage contribution of agriculture to gross domestic product (GDP).

Industry (share of GDP)
Industrial output shows the percentage contribution of industry to gross domestic product (GDP).

Services (share of GDP)
Services output shows the percentage contribution of services to gross domestic product (GDP).

Trade and Investment

Exports
Exports shows the total US dollar value of goods exported on an f.o.b. (free on board) basis.

Imports
Imports shows the total US dollar value of goods imported on a c.i.f. (cost, insurance, and freight) or f.o.b. (free on board) basis.

Main export partners
Main export partners are the destination countries that account for the highest percentage shares of a given country’s total value of exports. (Indicator shows the percentage share of exports the destination country receives.)

Main import partners
Main import partners are the sending countries that account for the highest percentage share of a given country’s total value of imports. (Indicator shows the percentage share of imports the sending country provides.)

Foreign direct investment
Foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows are flows of direct investment capital (equity capital, reinvested earnings, other capital, and various financial derivatives) into a country.

Official development assistance
Official development assistance is the net inflow of official development finance to a country. The figure includes assistance from the international financial institutions and donor nations (e.g. grants, loans). (Formal commitments of aid are included in the data. Grants by private organizations are omitted).

Government Spending

Government expenditure
Government expenditure is all nonrepayable payments by central government, whether requited or unrequited and whether for current or capital purposes. (These figures are calculated on an exchange rate basis, not in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms.)

Government revenue
Government revenue consists of all central government receipts. (These figures are calculated on an exchange rate basis, not in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms.)

Defense expenditure
Defense expenditure is a country's spending to meet the costs of maintaining and developing its armed forces as reported in the IISS Military Balance.

Def exp (Share of GDP)
Defense expenditure as a percentage of GDP is the total value of a country’s spending to meet the costs of maintaining and developing its armed forces as a share of the country’s gross domestic product.

Population

Population
An estimate of total population of a country based on statistics from population censuses, vital statistics registration systems, or sample surveys pertaining to the recent past and on assumptions about future trends.

Population growth rate
The average annual percent change in the population, resulting from a surplus (or deficit) of births over deaths and the balance of migrants entering and leaving a country. The rate may be positive or negative.

Life expectancy
Life expectancy (at birth) is the average number of years to be lived by a group of people born in the same year would live, if prevailing patterns of mortality were to remain constant (adult HIV/AIDS prevalence rate is available in Additional information).

Main religions
A rank ordering of religions by number of adherents starting with the largest group and sometimes includes the percent of total population.

Main ethnic groups
Main ethnic group lists the largest ethnic groups (up to three) in a country (indicator shows the percentage share of the country’s total population). a rank ordering of ethnic groups starting with the largest and normally includes the percent of total population.

Literacy rate
Literacy rate is the percentage of a population that is able to read and write at a specified age (varies by country).

Unemployment rate
Unemployment rate is the percentage of a country's labor force without jobs.

Poverty rate
Poverty rate is an estimate (often based on surveys of sub-groups) of the percentage of the population living below the national poverty line.

Energy and Environment

Total Primary Energy Consumption
Primary energy consumption is the amount of site consumption, plus losses that occur in the generation, transmission, and distribution of energy.

Total Primary Energy Production
Refers to the first supplies of energy before any changes to its form and includes hard coal and brown coal (anthracite coal, bituminous coal), lignite, peat, natural gas, crude oil, natural gas liquids, condensates, hydropower, nuclear power, and geothermal, wind, solar, tide, and combustible renewables and waste such as solid biomass, liquid biomass, biogas, municipal waste and industrial waste. Primary energy supply and production includes "commercial" energy, but does not include "non-commercial" energy such as animal waste and fuelwood for home cooking. Primary energy supply includes production and imports (plus or minus stock changes), but does not include exports or international marine bunkers.

Oil Consumption
Oil consumption is the sum of all refined petroleum products supplied. For each refined petroleum product, the amount supplied is calculated by adding production and imports, then subtracting changes in primary stocks (net withdrawals are a plus quantity and net additions are a minus quantity) and exports.

Oil Production
Oil production includes the volumes of crude oil that are extracted from oil reservoirs. These volumes are determined through measurement of the volumes delivered from lease storage tanks or at the point of custody transfer, with adjustment for (1) net differences between opening and closing lease inventories and (2) basic sediment and water. Crude oil used on the lease is considered production.

Oil Reserves
Oil reserves is the total volume of crude oil that is known or believed to exist in the country’s oil fields (data is shown in billions of barrels).

Electricity Generation
Electricity generation is the process of producing electric energy or the amount of electric energy produced by transforming other forms of energy, commonly expressed in kilowatthours (kWh) or megawatthours (MWh). Conventional thermal electricity generation is electricity generated by an electric power plant using coal, petroleum, or gas as its source of energy. Hydroelectric power is the use of flowing water to produce electrical energy. Nuclear electric power (nuclear power) is electricity generated by the use of the thermal energy released from the fission of nuclear fuel in a reactor. Geothermal energy is hot water or steam extracted from geothermal reservoirs in the earth's crust. Water or steam extracted from geothermal reservoirs can be used for geothermal heat pumps, water heating, or electricity generation. Solar energy is the radiant energy of the sun, which can be converted into other forms of energy, such as heat or electricity. Wind energy is kinetic energy present in wind motion that can be converted to mechanical energy for driving pumps, mills, and electric power generators. Wood and waste (as used at electric utilities) is wood energy, garbage, bagasse (sugarcane residue), sewerage gas, and other industrial, agricultural, and urban refuse used to generate electricity for distribution.

Carbon Dioxide Emissions
Carbon dioxide emissions is the amount of carbon dioxide by weight emitted into the atmosphere.

Total Area
Total area is the sum of all land and water areas delimited by international boundaries and/or coastlines.

Arable Land and Permanent Crops
Arable land is land cultivated for crops that are replanted after each harvest like wheat, maize, and rice. Permanent crops includes land cultivated for crops that are not replanted after each harvest like citrus, coffee, and rubber; includes land under flowering shrubs, fruit trees, nut trees, and vines, but excludes land under trees grown for wood or timber.

Communications and Transportation

Telephone subscribers
Telephone subscribers is the total number of main telephone lines in use.

Mobile phone subscribers
Mobile phone subscribers is the total number of mobile cellular telephones in use.

Internet subscribers
Internet subscribers is the total number of people within a country that access the Internet. (Statistics vary from country to country and frequency of use.)

Airports (paved)
Airports is the total number of airports in a country with paved runways.

Armed Forces

Armed Forces
Armed forces is the total number of personnel on active military duty, including conscripts and active-duty reserves. (Breakdown by service is available in additional information).

Main Battle Tanks
Tanks is the total number of armored, tracked combat vehicles armed with a 360° traverse gun of at least 75mm caliber.

Artillery
Artillery is the total number of towed and self-propelled weapons with a caliber of at least 100mm and above, capable of engaging ground targets by delivering primarily indirect fire, such as guns, howitzers, and multiple rocket launchers.

Surface Combatant Vessels
Surface combatant vessels is the total number of surface ships with a weapons system for other than self-protection and 1,000 tons full load displacement, such as aircraft carriers, cruisers, destroyers, ships, and frigates.

Submarines
Submarines is the total number of submarine vessels equipped for military operations and designed to operate primarily below the surface. (Number of strategic submarines, if available, is in additional information.)

Aircraft Carriers
Aircraft carriers is the total number of surface ships with a flight deck that extends beyond two-thirds of the vessel's length that are designed for launching air combat operations.

Combat Aircraft
Combat aircraft is the total number of aircraft equipped to deliver air-to-air or air-to-surface ordnance. (Number of strategic bombers, if available, is in additional information.)

Attack Helicopters
Attack helicopters is the total number of helicopters equipped to deliver ordnance, including for anti-submarine warfare, as well as helicopters with an integrated fire control and aiming system, designed to deliver anti-armor, air-to-ground or air-to-air weapons.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Nuclear weapons status
Nuclear weapons status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing nuclear weapons.

Chemical weapons status
Chemical weapons status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing chemical weapons.

Biological weapons status
Biological weapons status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing biological weapons.

Short-range ballistic missile status
Short-range ballistic missile status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing ballistic missiles with a range of less than 1,000 kilometers. (Breakdown by type of SRBM, if available, is in additional information).

Medium-range ballistic missile status
Medium-range ballistic missile status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing ballistic missiles with a range of 1,000-3,000 kilometers. (Breakdown by type of MRBM, if available, is in additional information).

Intermediate-range ballistic missile status
Intermediate-range ballistic missile status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing ballistic missiles with a range of 3,000-5,500 kilometers. (Breakdown by type of IRBM, if available, is in additional information).

Submarine-launched ballistic missile status
Submarine-launched ballistic missile status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing submarine-launched ballistic missiles. (Number of SLBMs, if available, is in additional information).

Intercontinental ballistic missile status
Intercontinental ballistic missile status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing ballistic missiles with a range of over 5,500 kilometers. (Number and type of ICBMs, if available, is in additional information).

Strategic bomber status
Strategic bomber status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing combat aircraft designed for long-range strike missions against strategic targets such as supply bases, bridges, factories, and shipyards, including with nuclear weapons. (Number of strategic bombers, if available, is in additional information).

Strategic submarine status
Strategic submarine status indicates whether a country is known to possess or suspected of possessing submarines capable of launching nuclear missiles (SSBNs). (Number of strategic submarines, if available, is in additional information).

WMD Commitments
WMD Commitments is a list of major international treaties regarding weapons of mass destruction to which the country is a signatory.

Politics and International Relations

Multilateral organizations
Multilateral organizations is a list of significant multilateral trade and security organizations of which a country is a member.

Head of state
Head of state is the name of a country's head of state, whether or not elected.

Prime minister
Prime minister is the name of a country's prime minister or leading political figure, plus political affiliation and the date of his/her accession to office.

Upper house
Upper House is the English name for the country's upper house in the case of bicameral legislature or in the case of a unicameral legislature is not applicable. Additional information includes the local name, how many seats are elected, appointed or otherwise filled, and the date for the next election.

Dominant party (U)
The dominant party in the upper house is the party that either has a majority or a large plurality of the seats AND is the Prime Minister's party. Additional information includes the current composition of the upper house by political party (only parties of significance are noted) and the name of the party chairperson.

Territorial disputes
Territorial disputes is a list of states with which a country has an ongoing dispute over the demarcation of a border, the occupation of a territory, or jurisdiction over a territory. A linked country profile gives more information on each dispute.

Lower house
Lower House is the English name for the country's lower house in the case of bicameral legislature or for the unicameral legislative body. Additional information includes the local name, how many seats are elected, appointed or otherwise filled, and the date for the next election.

Dominant party (L)
The dominant party in the lower house is the party that either has a majority or a large plurality of the seats AND is the Prime Minister's party. Additional information includes the current composition of the lower house by political party (only parties of significance are noted) and the name of the party chairperson.

Finance

Inflation
Inflation is a percentage derived from the consumer price index (CPI). It reflects changes in the cost of acquiring a fixed basket of goods and services by the average consumer.

Currency
Currency is the name of a country's local currency unit.

Exchange rate
Exchange rate is a number of local currency units per US dollar. Official exchange rate is generally determined by a country's central bank. Market exchange rate is generally determined by market forces. Exchange rates are period averages (rf series).

External debt
External debt is long-term public debt that has a maturity of more than one year and that is owed to nonresidents and is repayable in foreign currency, goods, or services.

Foreign exchange reserves
Foreign exchange reserves generally include foreign currencies, other assets denominated in foreign currencies, gold, and special drawing rights.