Where Is Honduras and What
Is It Known For?

Coral reef off the coast of Roatan, Honduras.

Honduras, in central America, is a mountainous and forested country with lowland areas along its long Caribbean and short Pacific coasts. It was formerly known as Spanish Honduras to differentiate it from British Honduras (now Belize).

The country is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of Fonseca, and to the north by the Gulf of Honduras, a large inlet of the Caribbean Sea. Its size is just over 112,000 km² with an estimated population of almost eight million. Its capital is Tegucigalpa.

Coastal areas are hot and humid with heavy summer rainfall; inland is cooler and drier. Most of the population lives in the central valleys. Coffee and bananas are the main exports, along with shellfish and zinc. Industry involves mainly agricultural processing.

In 1998, Hurricane Mitch caused such massive and widespread loss that former Honduran President Carlos Roberto Flores claimed that fifty years of progress in the country were reversed. Mitch obliterated about 70 percent of the crops and an estimated 70-80 percent of the transportation infrastructure, including nearly all bridges and secondary roads. Across the country, 33,000 houses were destroyed, an additional 50,000 damaged, some 5,000 people killed, 12,000 injured — for a total loss estimated at $3 billion USD.

The 2008 Honduran floods were severe and around half the country's roads were damaged or destroyed as a result.