Kronenburg Estates S.L.

Slovakia, officially the Slovak Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, the Czech Republic to the west, Hungary to the south, and Austria to the southwest. Slovakia's territory spans about 49,000 square kilometres and is mostly mountainous. The population is over 5.4 million and consists mostly of Slovaks. The capital and largest city is Bratislava, second largest city is Košice. The official language is Slovak.

Slovakia is a high-income advanced economy with a very high Human Development Index, a very high standard of living and performs favourably in measurements of civil liberties, press freedom, internet freedom, democratic governance and peacefulness. The country maintains a combination of market economy with a comprehensive social security system. Citizens of Slovakia are provided with universal health care, free education and one of the longest paid maternity leave in the OECD. The country joined the European Union in 2004 and the Eurozone on 1 January 2009. Slovakia is also a member of the Schengen Area, NATO, the United Nations, the OECD, the WTO, CERN, the OSCE, the Council of Europe and the Visegrád Group. Although regional income inequality is high, 90% of citizens own their homes. In 2018, Slovak citizens had visa-free or visa-on-arrival access to 167 countries and territories, ranking the Slovak passport 12th in the world. Slovakia is the world's largest per-capita car producer with a total of 1,040,000 cars manufactured in the country in 2016 alone and the 7th largest car producer in the European Union. The car industry represents 43% of Slovakia's industrial output, and a quarter of its exports.

Geography

Slovakia lies between latitudes 47° and 50° N, and longitudes 16° and 23° E.

The Slovak landscape is noted primarily for its mountainous nature, with the Carpathian Mountains extending across most of the northern half of the country. Among these mountain ranges are the high peaks of the Fatra-Tatra Area (including Tatra Mountains, Greater Fatra and Lesser Fatra), Slovak Ore Mountains, Slovak Central Mountains or Beskids. The largest lowland is the fertile Danubian Lowland in the southwest, followed by the Eastern Slovak Lowland in the southeast. Forests cover 41% of Slovak land surface.

Tatras, with 29 peaks higher than 2,500 metres (8,202 feet) AMSL, are the highest mountain range in the Carpathian Mountains. Tatras occupy an area of 750 square kilometres, of which the greater part 600 square kilometres lies in Slovakia. They are divided into several parts.

To the north, close to the Polish border, are the High Tatras which are a popular hiking and skiing destination and home to many scenic lakes and valleys as well as the highest point in Slovakia, the Gerlachovský štít at 2,655 metres and the country's highly symbolic mountain Kriváň. To the west are the Western Tatras with their highest peak of Bystrá at 2,248 metres and to the east are the Belianske Tatras, smallest by area.

Separated from the Tatras proper by the valley of the Váh river are the Low Tatras, with their highest peak of Ďumbier at 2,043 metres.

The Tatra mountain range is represented as one of the three hills on the coat of arms of Slovakia.

Climate

The Slovak climate lies between the temperate and continental climate zones with relatively warm summers and cold, cloudy and humid winters. Temperature extremes are between −41 to 40.3 °C although temperatures below −30 °C are rare. The weather differs from the mountainous north to the plains in the south.

The warmest region is Bratislava and Southern Slovakia where the temperatures may reach 30 °C in summer, occasionally to 39 °C in Hurbanovo. During night, the temperatures drop to 20 °C. The daily temperatures in winter average in the range of −5 °C to 10 °C. During night it may be freezing, but usually not below −10 °C.

Spring starts with 21 March and is characterised by colder weather with average daily temperature of 9 °C (48 °F) in the first weeks and about 14 °C in May and 17 °C in June. In Slovakia, the weather and climate in the spring is very unstable.

Summer starts on 22 June and is usually characterised by hot weather with daily temperatures exceeding 30 °C. July is the warmest month with temperatures up to about 37 to 40 °C, especially in regions of southern Slovakia – in the urban area of Komárno, Hurbanovo or Štúrovo. Showers or thunderstorms may occur because of the summer monsoon called Medardova kvapka (Medard drop – 40 days of rain). Summer in Northern Slovakia is usually mild with temperatures around 25 °C

Autumn in Slovakia starts on 23 September and is mostly characterised by wet weather and wind, although the first weeks can be very warm and sunny. The average temperature in September is around 14 °C, in November to 3 °C. Late September and early October is a dry and sunny time of year.

Winter starts on 21 December with temperatures around −5 to −10 °C. In December and January it is usually snowing, these are the coldest months of the year. At lower altitudes, snow does not stay the whole winter, it is changing into the thaw and frost. Winters are colder in the mountains, where the snow usually lasts until March or April and the night temperatures fall to −20 °C and colder.

In Slovakia, there are four seasons, each season (Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter) lasts three months. The dry continental air brings in the summer heat and winter frosts. In contrast, oceanic air brings rainfalls and reduces summer temperatures. In the lowlands and valleys fog is often, especially in winter.

Demographics

According to the 2011 census, the majority of the inhabitants of Slovakia are Slovaks (80.7%). Hungarians are the largest ethnic minority (8.5%). Other ethnic groups include Roma (2%), Czechs (0.6%), Rusyns (0.6%) and others or unspecified (7.6%). Unofficial estimates on the Roma population are much higher, around 5.6%.

In 2007 Slovakia was estimated to have a total fertility rate of 1.33 (i.e., the average woman will have 1.33 children in her lifetime), which is significantly below the replacement level and is one of the lowest rates among EU countries.

Languages

The official language is Slovak, a member of the Slavic language family. Hungarian is widely spoken in the southern regions, and Rusyn is used in some parts of the Northeast. Minority languages hold co-official status in the municipalities in which the size of the minority population meets the legal threshold of 15% in two consecutive censuses.

Slovakia is ranked among the top EU countries regarding the knowledge of foreign languages. In 2007, 68% of the population aged from 25 to 64 years claimed to speak two or more foreign languages, finishing 2nd highest in the European Union. The best known foreign language in Slovakia is Czech. Eurostat report also shows that 98.3% of Slovak students in the upper secondary education take on two foreign languages, ranking highly over the average 60.1% in the European Union.

The deaf community uses the Slovak Sign Language. Even though spoken Czech and Slovak are similar, the Slovak Sign language is not particularly close to Czech Sign Language.

Religion

The Slovak constitution guarantees freedom of religion. In 2011, 62.0% of Slovaks identified themselves as Roman Catholics, 8.9% as Protestants, 3.8% as Greek Catholics, 0.9% as Orthodox, 13.4% identified themselves as atheists or non-religious, and 10.6% did not answer the question about their belief. In 2004, about one third of the then church members regularly attended church services. The Slovak Greek Catholic Church is an Eastern rite sui iuris Catholic Church. Before World War II, an estimated 90,000 Jews lived in Slovakia (1.6% of the population), but most were murdered during the Holocaust. After further reductions due to postwar immigration and assimilation, only about 2,300 Jews remain today (0.04% of the population).

In 2016, Slovak parliament passed a new bill that will obstruct Islam and other religious organisations from becoming state-recognised religion by doubling the minimum followers threshold from 25,000 to 50,000. The law passed by a two-third majority at the parliament. In 2010, there were an estimated 5,000 Muslims in Slovakia representing less than 0.1% of the country's population. Slovakia is the last member state of the European Union without a mosque.