Asia

Abstract

Asia is both the largest continent geographically and the most populated with over 4.5 billion people (60 per cent of the world's population), dominated by the economies and populations of both China and India. The average rural population of the 48 Asian countries is 38.2 per cent, although this varies enormously: from the city-state of Singapore with no rural population, to Sri Lanka with 81 per cent of residents residing in rural locations. There is, indeed, enormous diversity across the countries which constitute Asia, as well as diversity across regions within a country such as China - socially, economically, politically, religiously, culturally and geographically.