Italy 
Facts
Population: 58,147,733 (July 2007 est.).
Age structure: 0-14 years: 13.8% (male 4,121,246/female 3,874,971)
15-64 years: 66.4% (male 19,527,203/female 19,059,897)
65 years and over: 19.9% (male 4,823,244/female 6,741,172) (2007 est.).
Population growth rate: 0.01% (2007 est.).
Birth rate: 8.54 births/1,000 population (2007 est.).
Death rate: 10.5 deaths/1,000 population (2007 est.).
Net migration rate: 2.06 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2007 est.).
Sex ratio: at birth: 1.07 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.064 male(s)/female
15-64 years: 1.025 male(s)/female
65 years and over: 0.715 male(s)/female
total population: 0.959 male(s)/female (2007 est.).
Infant mortality rate: total: 5.72 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 6.3 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 5.1 deaths/1,000 live births (2007 est.).
Life expectancy at birth: total population: 79.94 years
male: 77.01 years
female: 83.07 years (2007 est.).
Total fertility rate: 1.29 children born/woman (2007 est.).
HIV/AIDS - adult prevalence rate: 0.5% (2001 est.).
HIV/AIDS - people living with HIV/AIDS: 140,000 (2001 est.).
HIV/AIDS - deaths: less than 1,000 (2003 est.).
Nationality: noun: Italian(s)
adjective: Italian.
Ethnic groups: Italian (includes small clusters of German-, French-, and Slovene-Italians in the north and Albanian-Italians and Greek-Italians in the south).
Religions: Roman Catholic 90% (approximately; about one-third regularly attend services), other 10% (includes mature Protestant and Jewish communities and a growing Muslim immigrant community).
Languages: Italian (official), German (parts of Trentino-Alto Adige region are predominantly German speaking), French (small French-speaking minority in Valle d'Aosta region), Slovene (Slovene-speaking minority in the Trieste-Gorizia area).
Literacy: definition: age 15 and over can read and write
total population: 98.4%
male: 98.8%
female: 98% (2001 census).
GDP (purchasing power parity): $1.756 trillion (2006 est.).
GDP - real growth rate: 1.9% (2006 est.).
GDP - per capita (PPP): $30,200 (2006 est.).
GDP - composition by sector: agriculture: 2%
industry: 29.1%
services: 69% (2006 est.).
Labor force: 24.63 million (2006 est.).
Labor force - by occupation: agriculture: 5%
industry: 32%
services: 63% (2001).
Population below poverty line: NA%.
Household income or consumption by percentage share: lowest 10%: 2.1%
highest 10%: 26.6% (2000).
Inflation rate (consumer prices): 2.3% (2006 est.).
Unemployment rate: 7% (2006 est.).
Budget: revenues: $832.9 billion
expenditures: $925 billion; including capital expenditures of $NA (2006 est.).
Agriculture - products: fruits, vegetables, grapes, potatoes, sugar beets, soybeans, grain, olives; beef, dairy products; fish.
Industries: tourism, machinery, iron and steel, chemicals, food processing, textiles, motor vehicles, clothing, footwear, ceramics.
Industrial production growth rate: 1.5% (2006 est.).
Electricity - production: 277.6 billion kWh (2004).
Electricity - consumption: 303.8 billion kWh (2004).
Electricity - exports: 800 million kWh (2004).
Electricity - imports: 46.4 billion kWh (2004).
Exports: $450.1 billion f.o.b. (2006 est.).
Exports - commodities: engineering products, textiles and clothing, production machinery, motor vehicles, transport equipment, chemicals; food, beverages and tobacco; minerals, and nonferrous metals.
Exports - partners: Germany 13.2%, France 12.3%, US 8%, Spain 7.5%, UK 6.6% (2005).
Imports: $445.6 billion f.o.b. (2006 est.).
Imports - commodities: engineering products, chemicals, transport equipment, energy products, minerals and nonferrous metals, textiles and clothing; food, beverages, and tobacco.
Imports - partners: Germany 17.4%, France 10%, Netherlands 5.7%, China 4.6%, Belgium 4.5%, Spain 4.3%, UK 4% (2005).
Debt - external: $1.957 trillion (30 June 2006 est.).
Economic aid - donor: ODA, $1 billion (2002 est.).
Currency (code): euro (EUR)
note: on 1 January 1999, the European Monetary Union introduced the euro as a common currency to be used by financial institutions of member countries; on 1 January 2002, the euro became the sole currency for everyday transactions within the member countries.
Exchange rates: euros per US dollar - 0.7964 (2006), 0.8041 (2005), 0.8054 (2004), 0.886 (2003), 1.0626 (2002).
Fiscal year: calendar year.
Statistics: C.I.A. World Factbook. Updated: July 20, 2007.
Press
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Displaying 1 to 7 of 72 items.
(Independent daily), Bolzano
http://www.altoadige.it/
(Daily), Aosta
http://www.aostaoggi.it/
Avanti
(Socialist), Rome
(Catholic-oriented), Milan
http://www.avvenire.it/
Capital
(Business and lifestyle monthly), Milan
(communist/advocacy), Rome
http://www.carta.org
(Centrist), Milan
http://www.corriere.it/
Italy in the News
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Displaying 25 to 28 of 30 items.
World Press Review - Franz Haas, writing for Switzerland's Neue Zurcher Zeitung, wonders where the opposition to Berlusconi has gone.
Budapest, 1943: Giorgio Perlasca, posing as the city’s Spanish attaché, protects two Jewish boys on their way to deportation by letting them sit in his limousine.
While resistance to the Americanization of mass culture takes different forms—most notably, the 1999 demolition of a McDonald’s restaurant by a French farmer—Carlo Petrini prefers to disagree by example. In his case, it means taking it slow.
It felt to many as if an old friend had died. Rome’s L’Unità, the newspaper that served as the bible of the Italian left and the official mouthpiece of the largest Communist Party in the West, announced its closure in early August.
Americas 
