ROMANIA at a GLANCE
National Statistics Board (INS)
Population 19,700,000
Size 238,000 sq km, 93,000 sq miles
GDP $245 billion (2017)
GDP PPP $23,000 (per capita 2018)
Literacy 96%
Ethnic groups Romanian 87%, Hungarian 6.6%, Roma 5%, Ukrainian 0.3%, German 0.3%, Russian 0.2%, Turkish 0.2%, other 0.4% (2002)
Languages Romanian (Latin) (details), Hungarian, German, plus others
Religions Eastern Orthodox (majority), Catholic, Greco-Catholic, Unitarian, Evangelical/Lutheran Protestant
Historic events (timelines)
1859 – Wallachia and Moldavia unite
1881 – Monarchy established (Carol I) w. Parliamentary system and current tricolor flag adopted
1920 – Romania gains Transylvania
1941 – Collaboration w. Nazi Germany
1944 – Coup turns govt against Germany
1947 – Dec: King Michael forced to abdicate; Communists take-over
1989 – Dec: Communist regime overthrown (Ceausescu killed)
1992 – First free post-Communist elections
2005 – EU Accession Treaty Signed
2007 – EU Membership Formalized
2014 – Romanian open access to EU labor market
WIKIPEDIA on ROMANIA: see
DID YOU KNOW . . .
– The first jet plane to fly was invented by a Romanian, Henri Coanda see
– The game of baseball was perhaps first played in Romania and called “Oina”
– First evidence of “writing” was discovered in the Danube basin (before Summerian)
– Oil first exploited commercially in 1857 see, two years before oil discovered in Pennsylvania
– First compressed gaz operation in Europe – 1914 see
– Unitarian Church was founded in Cluj, Transylvania
– 2300 Allied airmen died in bombing raids on Ploesti’s oild fields in WW II
– The “Desert Fox” Rommel first fought as an officer on the Romanian front in WW I and was defeated in his battle zone of Onesti (Hill 789)
– The modernist “Dada” movement of the 1920s was co-founded by a Romanian<