Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific and northward into

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific and northward into the Arctic Ocean. Canada is the world's second-largest country by total area, and its common border with the United States is the world's longest land border.

The land that is now Canada has been inhabited for millennia by various Aboriginal peoples. Beginning in the late 15th century, British and French colonial expeditions explored, and later settled, the region's Atlantic coast. France ceded nearly all of its colonies in North America to Britain in 1763 after the Seven Years' War. In 1867, with the union of three British North American colonies through Confederation, Canada was formed as a federal dominion of four provinces. This began an accretion of provinces and territories and a process of increasing autonomy, culminating in the Canada Act 1982.

Canada is a federal state governed as a parliamentary democracy and a constitutional monarchy, with Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state. The country is officially bilingual and multicultural at the federal level, with a population of approximately 33.4 million as of 2011. Canada's advanced economy is one of the world's largest and relies largely upon its natural resources and international trade, particularly with the United States, with which it has had a long and complex relationship. Per capita income is the world's ninth highest, and Canada ranks sixth globally in human development. It performs favourably in international rankings of education, quality of life, government transparency, and economic freedom. Canada is a member of the G7, G8, G20, NATO, OECD, WTO, Commonwealth of Nations, Francophonie, OAS, APEC, and the United Nations.

Geography

Canada occupies a major northern portion of North America, sharing land borders with the United States to the south and the US state of Alaska to the northwest. Canada stretches from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west; to the north lies the Arctic Ocean. By total area (including its waters), Canada is the second-largest country in the world, after Russia. By land area alone, Canada ranks fourth.

Boreal forests prevail on the rocky Canadian Shield, while ice and tundra are prominent in the Arctic. Glaciers are visible in the Canadian Rockies and Coast Mountains. The flat and fertile prairies facilitate agriculture. The Great Lakes feed the St. Lawrence River in the southeast, where lowlands host much of Canada's population.

Since 1925, Canada has claimed the portion of the Arctic between 60° and 141°W longitude, but this claim is not universally recognized. Canada is home to the world's northernmost settlement, Much of the Canadian Arctic is covered by ice and permafrost. Canada has the longest coastline in the world, with a total length of 202,080 kilometres (125,570 mi); additionally, its border with the United States is the world's longest land border, stretching 8,891 kilometres (5,525 mi).

Since the end of the last glacial period, Canada has consisted of eight distinct forest regions, including extensive boreal forest on the Canadian Shield. Canada has around 31,700 large lakes, more than any other country, containing much of the world's fresh water. There are also fresh-water glaciers in the Canadian Rockies and the Coast Mountains. Canada is geologically active, having many earthquakes and potentially active volcanoes, notably Mount Meager, Mount Garibaldi, Mount Cayley, and the Mount Edziza volcanic complex.^[90] The volcanic eruption of the Tseax Cone in 1775 was among Canada's worst natural disasters, killing 2,000 Nisga'a people and destroying their village in the Nass River valley of northern British Columbia. The eruption produced a 22.5-kilometre (14.0 mi) lava flow, and, according to Nisga'a legend, blocked the flow of the Nass River.

Canada's population density, at 3.3 inhabitants per square kilometre (8.5 /sq mi), is among the lowest in the world. The most densely populated part of the country is the Quebec City – Windsor Corridor, situated in Southern Quebec and Southern Ontario along the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River.

Average winter and summer high temperatures across Canada vary from region to region. Winters can be harsh in many parts of the country, particularly in the interior and Prairie provinces, which experience a continental climate, where daily average temperatures are near −15 °C (5 °F), but can drop below −40 °C (−40 °F) with severe wind chills. In noncoastal regions, snow can cover the ground for almost six months of the year, while in parts of the north snow can persist year-round. Coastal British Columbia has a temperate climate, with a mild and rainy winter. On the east and west coasts, average high temperatures are generally in the low 20s °C (70s °F), while between the coasts, the average summer high temperature ranges from 25 to 30 °C (77 to 86 °F), with temperatures in some interior locations occasionally exceeding 40 °C.

Canada's initial inhabitants originated in Asia; as they searched for food, people from that continent crossed the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia.

Over an indefinite period of time, a wide variety of unique Indian cultures and nations developed and prospered across most of North America, including all of Canada.

Convincing evidence exists that near the end of the 11th century, Leif Ericson, a seafaring Viking from Scandinavia, traversed the frigid waters of the North Atlantic Ocean and established a small settlement named Vinland along the coast of Newfoundland; it was eventually abandoned.

Giovanni Caboto, an Italian navigator and explorer, known in English as John Cabot, landed along the northeastern shore of Canada in 1497, and immediately claimed the land for his patron, King Henry VII of England. The Cabot discovery substantiated England's claim to a significant slice of North America.

News of this bountiful land soon spread across Europe, and in the years that followed, European fishing vessels regularly harvested the coastal waters. In 1524, not to be outdone by England, the King of France commissioned Giovanni da Verrazano to explore this New World.

The Italian explorer's discoveries along the eastern coastline of North America gave France its own claim to parts of this land. A decade later the King dispatched Jacques Cartier on another mission of discovery. Cartier and crew would make three trips into the Gulf of St. Lawrence area.

By the turn of the century, the French were heavily involved in the lucrative fur trading business in Canada. On one of those fur trapping missions in 1605, the French geographer and explorer, Samuel de Champlain, established France's first settlement in western Nova Scotia. Port Royal would later be abandoned, but in 1608, he founded a permanent colony at Quebec, a colony that would later become the capital of New France.

New France continued to grow, albeit slowly, and Champlain was appointed governor in 1633. Trois-Rivieres was founded in 1634, and Montreal, a missionary outpost established in 1642, would eventually grow to become Canada's largest city.

For the indigenous Indians, contact with these early Europeans proved disastrous, as explorers and traders unintentionally brought diseases, such as smallpox with them. Thousands would get sick and die, and relationships between Indians and Europeans were strained, at best.

The French, seemingly out of necessity, befriended several Indian nations, including the Algonquin and Huron. On the other hand, the Iroquois detested the French, and using weapons provided them by the British, waged relentless war on their sworn enemies.

In 1666, a detailed census of New France indicated a small population of just over 3,000. In contrast, the English were still controlling parts of Canada's Maritime Provinces, as well as their heavily-populated colonies on the Atlantic seaboard, colonies that would later form the heart of a new nation called America. Also, England's Hudson Bay Company, founded in 1670, would later become North America's most significant fur trader.

Conflict between these two nations was inevitable, and in the late 17th century the French (New France) began to fight the British (New England) for control of this valuable real estate. The French utilized their local Indians friends as allies, and those experienced warriors attacked numerous English settlements in the Colonies; countless houses were burned and many settlers were kidnapped or killed.

In 1713, the Treaty of Utrecht restored a certain level of peace between France and the forces of England. However, as part of that agreement, France was forced to cede Newfoundland, Hudson Bay, and Nova Scotia to England.

Regardless, the French continued to build forts across their massive territory for protection from Indians, and from the expanding influence of Britain in the Americas. By the middle of the 18th century, over 70,000 people inhabited New France, but Britain's colonies along the Atlantic Ocean coastline now exceeded one million.

During the Seven Years' War (1756–1763), a war involving all of the major European powers of the day, France was the biggest loser. Its position as a major colonial power in the Americas ended, as it lost much of its long-held possessions on the North America continent to the British.

That war verdict aside, eastern Canada was still culturally and politically French, and in the on-going effort to administer and control their new French-speaking territory, the British faced many problems, especially from Indians.

In one daring and unexpected move, rebels from within Britain's original colonies developed a plan to invade and capture all the Canada colony; Montreal was quickly taken, but the fort at Quebec held firm in an inspirational battle that changed the future of Canada forever.

After the American Revolutionary War ended in 1783, a large group of loyalists to the British Crown (Tories) immigrated to Canada from the American colonies.

In 1791, with this large English-speaking aggregation now living in French-speaking Canada, the British Parliament made its move. In a Constitutional Act, it split the Province of Quebec into Upper and Lower Canada; each to have its own representative government and its own individual lanquage.

Throughout the 18th century, the Hudson Bay Company gave traders the opportunity to explore uncharted lands in northern and western Canada. One of those fur traders, Samuel Hearne, discovered Great Slave Lake and became the first non-Indian to reach the Arctic Ocean over land.

In 1783, a prominent group of Montreal merchants began the North West Fur Trading Company, in direct competition with England's Hudson Bay Company. Alexander Mackenzie, one of their traders, and a Scottish-Canadian explorer, followed his now namesake river from its source to the Arctic Ocean. He later crossed the Rocky Mountains, finding a route to the Pacific Ocean. He was knighted for his efforts in 1802.

In the early 19th century tensions peaked between America and the British Empire over maritime power abuses, and the War of 1812 was the result.

After the war, waves of immigrants from the British Isles began to settle in this new frontier. By mid-century, that great migration had brought nearly 750,000 newcomers into eastern Canada.

In 1837, rebellions against British rule took place in both Upper and Lower Canada. A few local skirmishes in Upper Canada were outdone by more serious uprisings in Lower Canada. A declaration of independence was read in Napierville, but the British finally squelched, at least temporarily, the growing desire for sovereignty.

The British Parliament subsequently acted, and the Act of Union (1840) essentially merged both Upper and Lower Canada into a single centralized governmental entity, appropriately named - the Province of Canada.
It consisted of Canada East, the eastern portion of the modern-day Province of Quebec (a French-speaking region), and Canada West, the southern portion of the modern-day Province of Ontario, (a mainly English-speaking region).
That new government was first seated in Kingston. In 1845 it was moved to Montreal, then between Toronto and Quebec, and finally to Ottawa in 1865. It was a critical time in the constitutional history of Canada, as self-government procedures were in place, but that did not prevent disputes between French and English factions in the legislative assembly. Deadlocks were common, and proved to be one of the major reasons behind the Canadian Confederation in 1867.

On July 1, 1867, after discussions in London by all parties concerned, the British Parliament enabled the British North America Act, an act which gathered the Province of Canada, and the maritime colonies of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia into a single dominion. The term dominion was chosen to indicate Canada's status as a self-governing entity of the British Empire.

The annual celebration of the British North America Act is now Canada's National Day, or Canada Day, a federal statutory holiday celebrating the anniversary of the event.

As the Canadian Pacific Railway helped grow this new Dominion in all directions, its territory quickly expanded; Manitoba joined the Dominion in 1870, British Columbia in 1871, and Prince Edward Island in 1873. The gold rush of 1897 brought thousands of prospectors into the undeveloped western prairie lands, and in 1905, Saskatchewan and Alberta were admitted as provinces.

Canada's best participated admirably in World War I (1914-1918). Canadian Corps repeatedly spearheaded Allied attacks against the Germans, thus earning their battle scars and stripes, and the respect of their peers.

Following World War I, Canada experienced record expansion in business, both large and small. Technical advances and industrial production were moving off the chart. Unfortunately, a turndown was lurking.

The 1926 Imperial Conference, held in London, brought together the Prime Ministers of the Dominions of the British Empire. During that conference the Balfour Declaration established the principle that the Dominions are all equal in status, and not subordinate to the United Kingdom. That resolution was confirmed by the British Parliament, and Canada's sovereignty was the result.

The Great Depression of the 1930's brought an economic meltdown to many countries. In its wake it devastated Canada, especially in the provinces of Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

After Britain declared war on Germany in 1939, Canada followed suit and World War II began. Canadian troops were involved in many war-changing battles including the Battle of Normandy. In the end, the Allies defeated Germany and Canada paid a price. Nearly 50,000 Canadians gave their lives, with thousands wounded.

A positive by-product of World War II was that it ended any lingering effects of the Great Depression in Canada. To support the needs of the war, workers produced raw materials and manufactured goods in record quantities. Canada was again on an economic roll, and it would never look back.

After decades of bitter debate over its border with Quebec, Newfoundland joined Canada as a province in 1949; the massive St. Lawrence Seaway opened in 1959, and on February 15, 1965, Canada proudly flew its first official national banner, a red and white maple-leaf flag.

The British North America Act marked its 100th anniversary on July 1, 1967, and fifteen years later, in 1982, it was replaced by Canada's new constitution. Queen Elizabeth traveled to Ottawa and proclaimed the document as official, and constitutional powers were transferred from Great Britain to Canada.

With pride in their French heritage, Quebec began a movement in the 1960's to separate itself from Canada, and establish a French-speaking nation. The first vote on same failed, but in 1995, the government of Quebec tried a sovereignty vote again. It was rejected by a slim margin of less than 1%. In 1997, the Canadian Supreme Court ruled unilateral secession by a province to be unconstitutional, but that separatism fever still burns.

On May 4, 1992, voters in the Northwest Territories authorized the partition of their huge area into two separate territories, one to become a self-governing homeland for Inuit peoples, or Eskimos. That new territory was called Nunavut, meaning Our Land.

Canada is a land of vast distances and rich natural beauty and resources. As an affluent, high-tech industrial society in the trillion-dollar class, Canada resembles the United States in its market-oriented economic system, pattern of production, and affluent living standards.

Economy

Parliament Hill in Ottawa. Home of the federal government.

The manufacturing sector is a major employer in Ontario.

The Acura ZDX is built in Alliston. As of 2010, Ontario is the largest producer of automobiles in North America.

A Bombardier Q400 aircraft. The aircraft is built in Downsview, Toronto.

Ontario is Canada's leading manufacturing province, accounting for 52% of the total national manufacturing shipments in 2004.^[29] Ontario's largest trading partner is the American state of Michigan. The government of Ontario posted a record C$21.3 billion ($20.7 billion) deficit for the 2009-10 fiscal year.^[30] The province’s net debt will rise to C$220 billion in 2010-11, or a record 37% of gross domestic product.^[30]

Ontario's rivers, including its share of the Niagara River, make it rich in hydroelectric energy.^[31] In 2009 Ontario Power Generation generated 70% of the electricity of the province, of which 51% is nuclear, 39% is hydroelectric and 10% is fossil fuel derived.^[32] Much of the newer power generation coming online in the last few years is natural gas or combined cycle natural gas plants. OPG is not however responsible for the transmission of power, which is under the control of Hydro One. Despite its diverse range of power options, problems related to increasing consumption, lack of energy efficiency and aging nuclear reactors, Ontario has been forced in recent years to purchase power from its neighbours Quebec and Michigan to supplement its power needs during peak consumption periods.

An abundance of natural resources, excellent transportation links to the American heartland and the inland Great Lakes making ocean access possible via container ships, have all contributed to making manufacturing the principal industry, found mainly in the Golden Horseshoe region, which is the largest industrialized area in Canada, the southern end of the region being part of the North American Rust Belt. Important products include motor vehicles, iron, steel, food, electrical appliances, machinery, chemicals, and paper. Ontario surpassed Michigan in car production, assembling 2.696 million vehicles in 2004. Ontario has Chrysler plants in Windsor and Bramalea, two GM plants in Oshawa and one in Ingersoll, a Honda assembly plant in Alliston, Ford plants in Oakville and St. Thomas and Toyota assembly plants in Cambridge and Woodstock.

However, as a result of steeply declining sales, in 2005, General Motors announced massive layoffs at production facilities across North America including two large GM plants in Oshawa and a drive train facility in St. Catharines resulting in 8,000 job losses in Ontario alone. In 2006, Ford Motor Company announced between 25,000 and 30,000 layoffs phased until 2012; Ontario was spared the worst, but job losses were announced for the St. Thomas facility and the Windsor Casting plant. However, these losses will be offset by Ford's recent announcement of a hybrid vehicle facility slated to begin production in 2007 at its Oakville plant and GM's re-introduction of the Camaro which will be produced in Oshawa. On December 4, 2008 Toyota announced the grand opening of the RAV4 plant in Woodstock,^[33] and Honda also has plans to add an engine plant at its facility in Alliston. Despite these new plants coming online, Ontario has not yet fully recovered following massive layoffs caused by the global recession; its unemployment rate was 8.1% (as of October 2011),^[34] compared to 8.7% in Jan. 2010^[35] and roughly 6% in 2007.

Toronto, the capital of Ontario, is the centre of Canada's financial services and banking industry. Neighbouring cities forming part of the Greater Toronto Area, such as Brampton, Mississauga and Vaughan, are large product distribution and IT centres, in addition to having various manufacturing industries. The information technology sector is also important, particularly in the Silicon Valley North section of Ottawa, as well as the Waterloo Region, where the world headquarters of Research in Motion (the developers of the BlackBerry smartphone) is located. Providing more than 19% of the local jobs and employing more than 13% of the entire local population, Canada's Federal Government is by far the largest single employer in the National Capital Region, which centres on the border cities of Ontario's Ottawa and Quebec's Gatineau.^[36][37] Hamilton is the largest steel manufacturing city in Canada, and Sarnia is the centre for petrochemical production. Construction continues to employ more than 6½% of the province's work force as of June 2011.^[38]

Mining and the forest products industry, notably pulp and paper, are vital to the economy of Northern Ontario. More than any other region, tourism contributes heavily to the economy of Central Ontario, peaking during the summer months owing to the abundance of fresh water recreation and wilderness found there in reasonable proximity to the major urban centres. At other times of the year, hunting, skiing and snowmobiling are popular. This region has some of the most vibrant fall colour displays anywhere on the continent, and tours directed at overseas visitors are organized to see them. Tourism also plays a key role in border cities with large casinos, among them Windsor, Cornwall, Sarnia and Niagara Falls, which attract many U.S. visitors.^[39]

Agriculture

Once the dominant industry, agriculture occupies a small percentage of the population but still a large part of Southern Ontario's land area. As the following table shows, while the number of individual farms has steadily decreased and their overall size has shrunk at a lower rate, greater mechanization has supported increased supply to satisfy the ever increasing demands of a growing population base; this has also meant a gradual increase in the total amount of land used for growing crops.

Ontario Farming
Number of Farms	72,713	68,633	67,520	59,728	57,211
Total	Hectares	5,646,582	5,451,379	5,616,860	5,466,233	5,386,453
Acres	13,953,009	13,470,652	13,879,565	13,507,358	13,310,217
Planted Crops	Hectares	3,457,966	3,411,667	3,544,927	3,656,705	3,660,941
Acres	8,544,821	8,430,438	8,759,707	9,035,916	9,046,383
Source: Statistics Canada, Census of Agriculture.^[40]	Wikipedia.org/Ontario

Cattle, small grains and dairy were the common types of farms in the 2001 census. The fruit and grape growing industry is located primarily on the Niagara Peninsula and along Lake Erie, where tobacco farms are also situated. Market Vegetables are also grown in the rich soils of the Holland Marsh near Newmarket.

The area susinctly defined as the Corn Belt covers much of the southwestern area of the province extending as far north as close to Goderich, but corn and soy are grown throughout the southern portion of the province. Apple orchards are a common sight along the southern shore of Nottawasaga Bay (part of Georgian Bay) near Collingwood and along the northern shore of Lake Ontario near Cobourg. Tobacco production, centred in Norfolk County has decreased leading to an increase in some other new crop alternatives gaining popularity, such as hazelnuts and ginseng. The Ontario origins of Massey Ferguson, once one of the largest farm implement manufacturers in the world, indicate the importance agriculture once had to the Canadian economy. Southern Ontario's limited supply of agricultural land is going out of production at an increasing rate. Urban sprawl and farmland severances contribute to the loss of thousands of acres of productive agricultural land in Ontario each year. Over 2,000 farms and 150,000 acres (61,000 ha) of farmland in the GTA alone were lost to production in the two decades between 1976 and 1996. This loss represented approximately 18% of Ontario's Class 1 farmland being converted to urban purposes. In addition, increasing rural severances provide ever-greater interference with agricultural production.

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