Asia-Pacific (APAC [1] ) is the part of the world near the western Pacific Ocean. The Asia-Pacific region varies in area depending on the context, but it often includes countries in East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania that border the Pacific Ocean. South Asia, Mongolia, Myanmar, and the Russian Far East are generally included in a wider Asia-Pacific region. [2]
The term may include countries in North America and South America that are on the coast of the Eastern Pacific Ocean; the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, for example, includes Canada, Chile, Mexico, Peru, and the United States. Alternatively, the term sometimes comprises all of Asia except Central Asia and West Asia, as well as Oceania—for example, when dividing the world into large regions for commercial purposes (e.g., into APAC, EMEA, LATAM, and NA). [3] Central Asia and West Asia are almost never included. [4]
There is no clear-cut definition of "Asia-Pacific", and the regions included change depending on the context. The term has become popular since the late 1980s in commerce, finance, and politics. Despite the heterogeneity of the regions' economies, most individual nations within the zone are emerging markets experiencing rapid growth (compare the acronym "APEJ", "Asia-Pacific excluding Japan"). [5]
The Asia-Pacific region may include:
| Country / Territory | Area (km2) | Population | Pop. density (/km2) | GDP millions of USD (2018) | GDP per capita USD (2017) [6] | Capital |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Afghanistan | 652,230 | 38,042,000 | 58.3 | 19,900 | 577 | Kabul |
 American Samoa | 199 | 55,689 | 259 | 711 | 11,398.8 | Pago Pago |
 Australia | 7,692,024 | 25,553,000 | 2.8 | 1,500,000 | 59,655 | Canberra |
 Bangladesh | 147,570 | 156,594,962 | 1,033.5 | 287,630 | 1,359 | Dhaka |
 Bhutan | 38,394 | 742,737 | 18.0 | 6,384 | 2,804 | Thimphu |
 British Indian Ocean Territory | 54,400 | 3,000 | 58.3 | – | – | Camp Thunder Cove |
 Brunei | 5,765 | 415,717 | 67.3 | 17,426 | 26,939 | Bandar Seri Begawan |
 Cambodia | 181,035 | 15,205,539 | 81.8 | 16,899 | 1,270 | Phnom Penh |
 China | 9,596,961 | 1,357,380,000 | 145 | 10,355,350 | 8,123 | Beijing |
 Christmas Island | 135 | 1,843 | 10.39 | – | – | Flying Fish Cove |
 Cocos (Keeling) Islands | 14 | 544 | 43 | – | – | West Island |
 Cook Islands | 236.7 | 17,379 | 42 | 311 | 15,002.5 | Avarua |
 Fiji | 18,274 | 909,389 | 46.4 | 8,330 | 5,153 | Suva |
 French Polynesia | 4,167 | 275,918 | 78 | 5,623 | 20,098 | Papeete |
 Guam | 540 | 162,742 | 775 | 5,793 | 35,664.5 | Hagåtña |
 Hong Kong | 1,104 | 7,234,800 | 6,544 | 292,677 | 43,681 | Hong Kong |
 India | 3,287,263 | 1,324,171,354 | 398.8 | 2,716,746 | 1,939 | New Delhi |
 Indonesia | 1,904,569 | 252,164,800 | 124.66 | 856,066 | 3,570 | Jakarta |
 Japan | 377,944 | 126,434,964 | 337 | 4,769,804 | 38,894 | Tokyo |
 Kiribati | 811 | 110,136 | 152 | 187 | 1,625.3 | Tarawa |
 Laos | 236,800 | 6,320,000 | 27 | 11,707 | 2,353 | Vientiane |
 Macao | 29 | 541,200 | 18,662 | 36,428 | 73,187 | Macau |
 Malaysia | 329,847 | 30,185,787 | 90 | 336,913 | 9,503 | Kuala Lumpur |
 Maldives | 298 | 341,356 | 1,102.5 | 4,920 | 8,602 | Malé |
 Marshall Islands | 181.43 | 53,066 | 293 | 220 | 3,621.2 | Majuro |
 Micronesia | 702 | 104,937 | 158.1 | 383 | 3,058.4 | Palikir |
 Mongolia | 1,564,116 | 3,369,768 | 2 | 11,725 | 3,686 | Ulaanbaatar |
 Myanmar | 676,578 | 50,496,000 | 74 | 65,291 | 1,275 | Naypyidaw |
 Nauru | 21 | 11,200 | 480 | 114 | 9,030.1 | Yaren |
 Nepal | 147,181 | 26,494,504 | 180 | 62,384 | 730 | Kathmandu |
 New Caledonia | 18,576 | 278,500 | 14.5 | 9,894 | 12,579.6 | Nouméa |
 New Zealand | 268,021 | 4,853,496 | 16 | 201,028 | 39,427 | Wellington |
 Niue | 261.46 | 1,624 | 5.35 | 10 | 5,800 | Alofi |
 Norfolk Island | 34.6 | 1,748 | 61.9 | – | – | Kingston |
 North Korea | 120,540 | 24,895,000 | 198 | 27,820 | 583 | Pyongyang |
 Northern Mariana Islands | 464 | 55,144 | 113 | 1,242 | 28,163.8 | Saipan |
 Pakistan | 881,913 | 226,174,380 | 234.4 | 312,570 | 1,468 | Islamabad |
 Palau | 459 | 21,503 | 46.7 | 312 | 17,317.9 | Ngerulmud |
 Papua New Guinea | 462,840 | 6,732,000 | 15 | 16,096 | 2,183 | Port Moresby |
 Philippines | 343,448 | 110,705,000 | 307 | 289,686 | 2,951 | Manila |
 Pitcairn Islands | 47 | 50 | 45 | – | – | Adamstown |
 Russia | 17,098,246 | 147,003,104 | 8.4 | 1,630,659 | 11,288.9 | Moscow |
 Samoa | 2,842 | 195,843 | 68 | 861 | 4,392.5 | Apia |
 Singapore | 710 | 5,183,700 | 7,023 | 307,085 | 52,961 | Singapore |
 Solomon Islands | 28,400 | 599,419 | 18.1 | 1,424 | 2,162.7 | Honiara |
 South Korea | 100,210 | 51,302,044 | 500 | 1,699,000 | 27,539 | Seoul |
 Sri Lanka | 65,610 | 20,277,597 | 323 | 233,637 | 3,835 | Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte |
 Taiwan | 36,191 | 23,119,772 | 639 | 505,452 | 31,900 | Taipei |
 Thailand | 513,120 | 67,764,000 | 132 | 380,491 | 5,908 | Bangkok |
 Timor-Leste | 14,874 | 1,171,000 | 76 | 4,510 | 1,162 | Dili |
 Tokelau | 10 | 1,499 | 115 | 10 | 6,275 | (none) |
 Tonga | 748 | 100,651 | 139 | 470 | 4,364 | Nukuʻalofa |
 Tuvalu | 26 | 11,192 | 475.88 | 45 | 3,700.7 | Funafuti |
 Vanuatu | 12,189 | 272,459 | 19.7 | 957 | 3,033.4 | Port Vila |
 Vietnam | 331,210 | 88,069,000 | 265 | 187,848 | 2,186 | Hanoi |
 Wallis and Futuna | 142.42 | 11,558 | 83.55 | 188 | 12,640 | Mata Utu |
This is a list of the lists of islands in the world grouped by country, by continent, by body of water, and by other classifications. For rank-order lists, see the other lists of islands below.
Oceania is a geographical region that is described as a continent in some parts of the world. It includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern and Western hemispheres, at the center of the water hemisphere, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of about 9,000,000 square kilometres (3,500,000 sq mi) and a population of around 44.4 million as of 2022. Oceania is described as a geographical region in most of the English-speaking world, but outside of the English-speaking world, Oceania is described as one of the continents. In this model of the world, Australia is either seen as an island or a continental landmass contained inside of the larger continent of Oceania. When compared to the other continents, Oceania is the smallest in land area and the second-least populated after Antarctica.
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation is an inter-governmental forum for 21 member economies in the Pacific Rim that promotes free trade throughout the Asia-Pacific region. Following the success of ASEAN's series of post-ministerial conferences launched in the mid-1980s, APEC started in 1989, in response to the growing interdependence of Asia-Pacific economies and the advent of regional trade blocs in other parts of the world; it aimed to establish new markets for agricultural products and raw materials beyond Europe. Headquartered in Singapore, APEC is recognized as one of the highest-level multilateral blocs and oldest forums in the Asia-Pacific region, and exerts significant global influence.
Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of Oceania.
The Pacific Rim comprises the lands around the rim of the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Basin includes the Pacific Rim and the islands in the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Rim roughly overlaps with the geological Pacific Ring of Fire.
Northeast Asia or Northeastern Asia is a geographical subregion of Asia; its north-eastern landmass and islands are bounded by the Pacific Ocean.
A subregion is a part of a larger region or continent and is usually based on location. Cardinal directions, such as south are commonly used to define a subregion.
Pacific coast may be used to reference any coastline that borders the Pacific Ocean.
The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) is one of the five regional commissions under the jurisdiction of the United Nations Economic and Social Council. It was established in order to increase economic activity in Asia and the Far East, as well as to foster economic relations between the region and other areas of the world.
Geography of Asia reviews geographical concepts of classifying Asia, the central and eastern part of Eurasia, comprising approximately fifty countries.
The indigenous peoples of Oceania are Aboriginal Australians, Papuans, and Austronesians. These indigenous peoples have a historical continuity with pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories. With the notable exceptions of Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, New Caledonia, Guam, and Northern Mariana Islands, indigenous peoples make up the majority of the populations of Oceania.
A nuclear-weapon-free zone (NWFZ) is defined by the United Nations as an agreement that a group of states has freely established by treaty or convention that bans the development, manufacturing, control, possession, testing, stationing or transporting of nuclear weapons in a given area, that has mechanisms of verification and control to enforce its obligations, and that is recognized as such by the General Assembly of the United Nations. NWFZs have a similar purpose to, but are distinct from, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons to which most countries including five nuclear weapons states are a party. Another term, nuclear-free zone, often means an area that has banned both nuclear power and nuclear weapons, and sometimes nuclear waste and nuclear propulsion, and usually does not mean a UN-acknowledged international treaty.
This is a list of articles holding galleries of maps of present-day countries and dependencies. The list includes all countries listed in the List of countries, the French overseas departments, the Spanish and Portuguese overseas regions and inhabited overseas dependencies.
Although the military history of Oceania probably goes back thousands of years to the first human settlement in the region, little is known about war in Oceania until the arrival of Europeans. The introduction of firearms transformed conflict in the region; in some cases helping to unify regions and in others sparking large-scale tribal and civil wars. Force and the threat of force played a role in the annexation of most of Oceania to various European and American powers, but only in Australia and New Zealand did wars of conquest occur. Western Oceania was a major site of conflict in World War II as the Japanese Empire sought to expand southwards. Since 1945 the region has been mostly at peace, although Melanesia has suffered from Indonesian expansionism in some areas and civil wars and coups in others. The Australian Defence Force is by far the largest military force in Oceania.
Determining the boundaries between the continents is generally a matter of geographical convention. Several slightly different conventions are in use. The number of continents is most commonly considered seven but may range as low as four when Afro-Eurasia and the Americas are both considered as single continents. An island can be considered to be associated with a given continent by either lying on the continent's adjacent continental shelf or being a part of a microcontinent on the same principal tectonic plate. An island can also be entirely oceanic while still being associated with a continent by geology or by common geopolitical convention. Another example is the grouping into Oceania of the Pacific Islands with Australia and Zealandia.
East Asia is the easternmost region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethno-cultural terms. The modern states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. Hong Kong and Macau, two small coastal quasi-dependent territories located in the south of China, are officially highly autonomous but are under Chinese sovereignty. Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau are some of the world's largest and most prosperous economies. East Asia borders Siberia and the Russian Far East to the north, Southeast Asia to the south, South Asia to the southwest, and Central Asia to the west. To the east is the Pacific Ocean and to the southeast is Micronesia.
The following outline is provided as an overview and topical guide to Oceania.
APEJ (Asia-Pacific Excluding Japan) and EEMEA (Eastern Europe, Middle East, and Africa) will grow their combined share of this figure from 17 percent to 22 percent during the same period, as North America's share adjusts from 53 percent to 46 percent.
