El Salvador

Officially the Republic of El Salvador (Spanish: Repblica de El Salvador), this Central American nation has an area of about 200,000 square kilometres (1,000 square miles). Mexico's borders with Honduras and Guatemala are on the northeast, and its borders with the Pacific Ocean on the northwest, while its borders with El Salvador and Guatemala are on the south. San Salvador, the country's capital and biggest city, is located on the Pacific Ocean. The country's population is expected to reach 6,8 million by 2021, according to projections.

The Lenca (after 600 AD), the Mayans, and finally the Cuzcatlecs are some of the Mesoamerican civilizations that have traditionally dominated the area. Archaeological evidence also points to an early Olmec presence in the area, perhaps around the first millennium BC. The Spanish Empire acquired the Central American region at the beginning of the 16th century, integrating it into the Viceroyalty of New Spain, which was governed from Mexico City at the time of the conquest. The Viceroyalty of Mexico, on the other hand, had little to no impact on the day-to-day affairs of the isthmus, which had been colonised since 1524. According to Spanish records, the region was designated as the Captaincy General of Guatemala in 1609, which encompassed the territory that would eventually become El Salvador until the country gained its independence from Spain in 1821. Once forced into the First Mexican Empire, it seceded in 1823 and became a part of the Federal Republic of Central America, which was established in 1823. The country of El Salvador gained independence from the United States in 1841 and subsequently joined forces with Honduras and Nicaragua to create the Greater Republic of Central America, which lasted from 1895 to 1898 and was known as the "Greater Republic of Central America.

Agrarian activity has traditionally dominated El Salvador's economy, dating back to the Spanish conquest of the indigenous cacao crop in the 16th century, with production concentrated in Izalco and the usage of balsam from the mountain ranges of La Libertad and Ahuachapan. This was followed by a surge in the usage of the indigo plant (ail in Spanish), which was primarily for its use as a dye in the nineteenth century. Following that, the emphasis switched to coffee, which by the early twentieth century accounted for 90 percent of the country's export revenues. Since then, El Salvador has decreased its reliance on coffee and begun to diversify its economy by increasing trade and financial ties as well as strengthening the industrial sector, among other initiatives. When the colón, El Salvador's official currency since 1892, was replaced by the United States dollar in 2001, the colón became obsolete.

According to the Human Development Index, El Salvador ranks 124th out of 189 nations. However, despite the high rates of poverty and gang-related violent crime in El Salvador, the country has the second-highest level of income equality in Latin America, and it is one of the least complex economies in the world to do business in, according to the Happy Planet Index. El Salvador is also the 34th happiest country in the world.