Country profile - Distinguishing factors (Estonia)

SOER 2010 Country profile (Deprecated)

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SOER Country profile from Estonia

Published: 26 Nov 2010 Modified: 17 Feb 2025

Geography

Estonia is located on the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea, being the northernmost of the three Baltic States. Estonia is one of Europe’s smallest countries, its total area being only 45 227 km².

Estonia is a lowland country. Only southern Estonia is known for its hillocks and ”curved” landscape with plains in the north and west and hills in the southeast. The highest point — Suur Munamägi (Great Egg Hill) in the southeast - is only 318 m above sea level.

About one half of Estonia’s mainland is covered with forests. Wooded meadows in Estonia are among the most species-rich plant communities in the world as measured by the number of vascular plant species per one square metre. Peatlands account for about 22 % of the territory.

Estonia has the world's largest exploited deposits of oil-shale, which provide raw materials for power production and chemical industry. Of other mineral resources, Estonia has limestone and dolomite, but also sand, gravel and clay (Map 1).

Map 1. Distribution of mineral resource extraction permit areas according to county in 2008. Data: Land Board.

Climate and weather

Estonia is located within a transition zone from maritime to continental climate. The active cyclonic activity of the northern part of the Atlantic Ocean makes the weather very variable, causes strong winds, high precipitation and fluctuations in temperature and the Baltic Sea causes significant differences between the climate of coastal and inland areas. As mentioned, Estonia is very small by area, but at the same time temperatures may vary 20 °C, e.g. + 10 °C on islands and -10 °C in inland areas. Due to the climate conditions and latitude the average annual temperature in Estonia is only +5 °C and Estonia also has a great seasonal variation in daylight. Because of that, people in Estonia need extra electricity and heating during most of the year, from September until May.

Due to rather high precipitation (about 630 mm/year), the need for irrigation is much less significant than in the southern European countries.

Population

Estonia is home to about 1 340 415 people (1 January 2009), making it one of Europe’s smallest countries in terms of population as well as in terms of area. In the EU, only Cyprus, Malta and Luxembourg have smaller populations. Similar to Finland and Sweden, Estonia’s population density is one of Europe’s lowest – 31.2 per/km².

The proportion of urban population is 70 % (1.01.2008) and of rural population 30 %. Estonia’s main cities are small. About one-third or about 400 000 inhabitants of the total population live in the biggest city, the capital Tallinn. The other main cities are Tartu with approximately 98 000 and Narva with approximately 65 000 inhabitants.