Natural resources: timber, gold, silver, copper, lead, zinc, iron ore, antimony, coal, fish, hydropower
Population: 6,560,608

Honduras, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere with an extraordinarily unequal distribution of income, is banking on expanded trade privileges under the Enhanced Caribbean Basin Initiative and on debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative. While the country has met most of its macroeconomic targets, it failed to meet the IMF's goals to liberalize its energy and telecommunications sectors. Growth remains dependent on the status of the US economy, its major trading partner, on commodity prices, particularly coffee, and on containment of the recent rise in crime.
Agriculture: 18%
Industry: 32%
Services: 50% (2000 est.)
Population below poverty line: 53% (1993 est.)
Unemployment rate: 28% (2001 est.)
Industries: sugar, coffee, textiles, clothing, wood products
Currency: lempiras ($1 = 18.84 lempiras)

Part of Spain's vast empire in the New World, Honduras became an independent nation in 1821. After two-and-a-half decades of mostly military rule, a freely elected civilian government came to power in 1982. During the 1980s, Honduras proved a haven for anti-Sandinista contras fighting the Marxist Nicaraguan Government and an ally to Salvadoran Government forces fighting against leftist guerrillas.

The country was devastated by Hurricane Mitch in 1998, which killed about 5,600 people and caused almost $1 billion in damage. Then on July 13, 1999 an earthquake hit. The epicentre of the earthquake, with a magnitude of 6.5 on the Richter scale that hit the Caribbean coast of Honduras and Guatemala, was located south of San Pedro Sula (the economic centre in the North of the country - some 175 km from the country's capital). According to the UN Resident Coordinator in Honduras, the north, the northwest and the centre of the country have been affected.