Reference
With roughly 634,000 people on 163,820 square kilometres, Suriname is the least densely populated country in South America, and with over 90 percent forest cover it is the most forested country on earth. Below are 36 facts, each naming its source and the date we checked it.
163,820 km², slightly larger than England
Of that, 156,000 km² is land and 7,820 km² water. Suriname is the smallest sovereign country in South America and at the same time nearly four times the size of the Netherlands. That difference in scale is the first thing visitors misjudge: the inhabited coastal strip is narrow, and everything south of it is reached by boat or light aircraft, not by rental car.
Source: CIA World Factbook. Checked 2026-08-23.
Guyana, French Guiana and Brazil, plus 386 km of Atlantic coast
The land borders total 1,703 km: 600 km with Guyana to the west, 510 km with French Guiana to the east and 593 km with Brazil to the south. Two of those borders are rivers, the Corantijn and the Marowijne, and both carry an unresolved territorial dispute. The French Guiana border also means Suriname borders the European Union: French Guiana is a French department and uses the euro.
Source: CIA World Factbook. Checked 2026-08-23.
Ten
Brokopondo, Commewijne, Coronie, Marowijne, Nickerie, Para, Paramaribo, Saramacca, Sipaliwini and Wanica. The proportions are wildly uneven: Paramaribo is by far the smallest district by area and the largest by population, while Sipaliwini covers almost the entire interior and is barely inhabited. Districts are subdivided further into resorts (ressorten).
Source: CIA World Factbook. Checked 2026-08-23.
Paramaribo, and with Wanica it holds roughly two thirds of all Surinamese moves
Paramaribo district counted just over 240,000 residents at the 2012 census, and neighbouring Wanica just over 118,000. Together they form Greater Paramaribo, home to roughly two in three Surinamese on less than one percent of the territory. That has a practical consequence for a visitor: almost everything the country has by way of restaurants, markets, museums and shops sits within a ten kilometre radius.
Source: Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek (ABS), volkstelling 2012. Checked 2026-08-23.
Roughly 3.9 people per km², among the lowest on earth moves
For comparison, the Netherlands sits around 520 per km², more than a hundred and thirty times denser. The figure is also a misleading average, because the population sits almost entirely on the northern coastal strip. The interior, the size of a substantial European country, holds only a few tens of thousands of people, spread across villages along the rivers.
Source: Wereldbank (World Bank Open Data), cijfer over 2023. Checked 2026-08-23.
Juliana Top, roughly 1,230 to 1,280 metres
Sources disagree on the exact height. The CIA World Factbook gives 1,230 metres, other reference works give 1,280 metres, and we would rather print the disagreement than pick one number we cannot stand behind. The summit lies in the Wilhelmina Mountains in Sipaliwini district, deep in the interior with no road to it. For travellers, Brownsberg (about 500 metres, a little over two hours from Paramaribo) is the high point you can actually reach.
Source: CIA World Factbook (1.230 m) tegenover andere naslagwerken (1.280 m). Checked 2026-08-23.
25 November 1975
Johan Ferrier became the first president and Henck Arron the first prime minister. The date is called Srefidensi, from the Sranantongo for "own independence", and is the biggest national holiday of the year. In the run-up to 1975 and the years after it, a large share of the population left for the Netherlands, which is why the Surinamese community there today is roughly the size of half of Suriname itself.
Source: Nationaal Archief Nederland en Canon van Nederland. Checked 2026-08-23.
Yes, the historic inner city since 2002
UNESCO listed the historic inner city in 2002, under criteria (ii) and (iv). The value is not in any single building but in the whole: an intact seventeenth and eighteenth century street plan of timber houses in which Dutch building practice merged with local materials and techniques. Walk the Waterkant and the Gravenstraat and a few hundred metres show you why: the symmetry of an Amsterdam canal, executed in white-painted wood against the tropics.
Source: UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Checked 2026-08-23.
About 634,000 moves
The World Bank estimates the population at 634,431 at mid-2024, a slight rise from 628,886 in 2023. The most recent hard count remains the 2012 census, which returned 541,638; a ninth census has since been provided for by law, but its final results are not yet published. Until then, any figure above 600,000 is an estimate rather than a count, and should be cited that way.
Source: Wereldbank (World Bank Open Data), schatting medio 2024. Checked 2026-08-23.
No group holds a majority: the largest is 27.4%
At the 2012 census, 27.4% identified as Hindustani, 21.7% Maroon, 15.7% Creole, 13.7% Javanese, 13.4% mixed, 3.8% Indigenous and 1.5% Chinese. That is the figure behind the claim that Suriname is the most diverse country in South America, and it is not a slogan: it means no single group can unilaterally set the culture, the food or the politics. The most visible consequence for a visitor is on the street, where a mosque and a synagogue stand side by side on the Keizerstraat and one block of shops sells roti, bami and pom.
Source: Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek (ABS), volkstelling 2012. Checked 2026-08-23.
On 1 July 1863, but real freedom only came in 1873
On 1 July 1863 roughly 45,000 enslaved people in Suriname were declared free. There was a clause attached: state supervision (Staatstoezicht) required everyone between 15 and 60 to enter a labour contract on a plantation for a further ten years, so that the plantations would not empty out. Only on 1 July 1873 did that obligation lapse. The Netherlands abolished slavery almost thirty years later than Britain and France. The date is commemorated and celebrated in both Suriname and the Netherlands as Keti Koti, "broken chains".
Source: Nationaal Archief Nederland. Checked 2026-08-23.
From 5 June 1873 onward, more than 34,000 people in total
The ship Lalla Rookh docked on 5 June 1873 carrying 279 men, 70 women, 32 boys and 18 girls from British India. Between 1873 and 1916 more than 34,000 followed, about a third of whom returned when their contracts ended. They arrived exactly as state supervision lapsed and the plantations ran short of labour, and the contracts were harsh: fixed terms, fines, restricted freedom of movement. 5 June is now Prawas Din, Hindustani Immigration Day, and a national holiday.
Source: Nationaal Archief Nederland. Checked 2026-08-23.
From 9 August 1890 onward, 32,965 people in total
The first group numbered 94 people, mostly from Surakarta, arriving on the Prins Willem II after a seventy-day voyage from Java. Between 1890 and the last transports in 1939, 32,965 came; over 8,600 of them returned to Indonesia before 1954, and the large majority stayed. They brought the cooking that fills the warungs of Blauwgrond today, and a language still spoken at home alongside Sranantongo and Sarnami.
Source: Nationaal Archief Nederland. Checked 2026-08-23.
In 1853, ten years before the abolition of slavery
On 2 July 1853 the transport ship Merwede left Batavia with eighteen Chinese indentured labourers. Four died on the voyage and a fifth shortly after arrival; the remaining thirteen were put to work on the government sugar plantation Catharina Sophia in Saramacca. Between 1853 and 1874 a total of 2,630 came, far fewer than the later Hindustani and Javanese groups. That the planters brought them in as early as 1853 says exactly what it appears to say: abolition was coming and the replacement of the labour was arranged ten years in advance.
Source: Nationaal Archief Nederland. Checked 2026-08-23.
Six peoples, together 21.7% of the population
Maroons are the descendants of enslaved people who escaped the plantations and built their own societies in the interior, with their own languages, legal systems and authorities. There are six peoples: Ndyuka (Aukaners), Saamaka (Saramaccans), Matawai, Paamaka, Aluku (Boni) and Kwinti, the last numbering fewer than five hundred. Several of these peoples signed peace treaties with the colonial administration in the eighteenth century recognising their freedom and territory, generations before slavery was abolished. That is the heart of the story: this is a lineage of self-liberation, not of being freed.
Source: Minority Rights Group en Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek (volkstelling 2012). Checked 2026-08-23.
Roughly 20,300 people, 3.8% of the population
The four largest peoples are the Kaliña (Carib) and Lokono (Arawak) in the north, and the Trio and Wayana in the south. Smaller Amazonian peoples live in the deep interior, among them the Akurio, Warao and Wai-Wai. They are the original inhabitants of this land, thousands of years before European colonisation. Suriname is one of the few countries in the region where Indigenous land rights are still not recognised in law, an issue that has been taken as far as the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
Source: IWGIA (International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs), op basis van de volkstelling 2012. Checked 2026-08-23.
Roughly 370,000 with a Surinamese background moves
Statistics Netherlands (CBS) counts 181,000 people in the Netherlands born in Suriname and 189,000 born in the Netherlands with one or two Suriname-born parents, together roughly 370,000. Between 1975 and the end of 2024, 256,000 people emigrated from Suriname to the Netherlands. Set that against Suriname’s own population of about 634,000 and the picture is plain: a number equal to more than half of it lives on the other side of the ocean. That is why Dutch, and not English, is the first language of this site.
Source: Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek (CBS) Nederland. Checked 2026-08-23.
Dutch, and only Dutch
Dutch is the language of education, law, government, newspapers and the news. That makes Suriname the only country in South America with Dutch as its official language, and it has been a member of the Dutch Language Union since 2004. Surinamese Dutch is its own variety, with its own vocabulary and rhythm: it has words standard Dutch does not, and its sentence structure audibly leans on Sranantongo.
Source: Nederlandse Taalunie en Dialectloket (Universiteit Gent). Checked 2026-08-23.
At least twenty
Dutch is the official language, but for a large share of the population it is not the language spoken at home. Alongside Sranantongo, those include Sarnami, Surinamese Javanese, Hakka and Cantonese, the Maroon languages Ndyuka and Saamaka, and the Indigenous languages Kaliña, Lokono, Trio and Wayana. An average Surinamese switches effortlessly between three of them in a single day. As a visitor you get everywhere on Dutch, and four words of Sranantongo will take you further than forty words of Dutch.
Source: Taalunie en overzichtsliteratuur over de talen van Suriname. Checked 2026-08-23.
The lingua franca of Suriname, understood by almost everyone
Sranantongo means literally "Surinamese tongue". It is a creole that grew up on the plantations, with a vocabulary drawn largely from English and also from Dutch, Portuguese and West African languages. It is the language of the street, the market, the music and the jokes: at the Centrale Markt you hear it more than Dutch. A few words that work immediately: fa waka (how are you), switi (tasty or sweet, which is what this business is named after), tangi (thank you) and no span (no stress).
Source: Taalunie en overzichtsliteratuur over de talen van Suriname. Checked 2026-08-23.
The home languages of the indentured labour communities
Sarnami is the language of the Hindustani community, grown out of the Bhojpuri and Awadhi that indentured labourers brought from northern India from 1873 onward, and it is the country’s third language after Dutch and Sranantongo. Surinamese Javanese descends from the Javanese of the immigrants who arrived from 1890 and has developed here separately from Indonesia. The Chinese community historically spoke Hakka; more recent migration from China added Mandarin. All three are living languages rather than heritage curiosities: you hear them at the market, in the warung and on the radio.
Source: Taalunie en overzichtsliteratuur over de talen van Suriname. Checked 2026-08-23.
Ndyuka and Saamaka among the Maroons, Kaliña, Lokono, Trio and Wayana among Indigenous peoples
Ndyuka is spoken by the Ndyuka, Aluku and Paamaka; Saamaka by the Saamaka and Matawai. They are creole languages in their own right, not dialects of Sranantongo, and Saamaka carries a strikingly large share of Portuguese vocabulary from the era when many planters were Portuguese Jews. The Indigenous languages are more fragile: UNESCO lists Kaliña and Lokono as endangered, while Trio and Wayana are still passed on daily in the southern villages. Visiting the interior means visiting language territories, not scenery.
Source: Minority Rights Group en UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger. Checked 2026-08-23.
The Surinamese dollar (SRD), since 1 January 2004
The SRD replaced the Surinamese guilder on 1 January 2004, at a thousand guilders to one dollar: three zeroes removed and a new name. Do not confuse the SRD with the US dollar, which also circulates widely here and in which many tourist prices are quoted. In practice a visitor deals with three currencies: SRD for markets, taxis and food stalls, and euros or US dollars for hotels and tours.
Source: Centrale Bank van Suriname (CBvS). Checked 2026-08-23.
Roughly SRD 43 to the euro and SRD 38 to the US dollar moves
The Central Bank of Suriname published a weighted average for July 2026 of SRD 42.81 buying and 43.22 selling for the euro, and SRD 37.61 buying and 37.83 selling for the US dollar. This figure moves, and it is the most perishable number on this page: check it with the CBvS or a cambio before you change money. Cambios in Paramaribo usually beat the bank rate and comfortably beat the airport, and they want clean, unfolded 50 and 100 notes.
Source: Centrale Bank van Suriname (CBvS), gemiddelde maandkoersen juli 2026. Checked 2026-08-23.
UTC-3, all year round, with no daylight saving
Suriname does not move its clocks. The zone is America/Paramaribo, fixed at UTC-3, which means an appointment in Paramaribo falls at the same moment in every season. Until 1984 Suriname ran on UTC-3:30, half an hour out of step with its neighbours, and then moved to a whole hour.
Source: IANA Time Zone Database, via timeanddate.com. Checked 2026-08-23.
Four hours in Dutch winter, five hours in Dutch summer
The Netherlands is ahead of Suriname. From late October to late March that gap is four hours; during Dutch summer time it is five. The difference changes twice a year without Suriname doing anything: only the Netherlands moves its clocks. Practical consequence for family calls: 20:00 in Paramaribo is the middle of the night in the Netherlands, and 09:00 in the Netherlands is around sunrise here.
Source: IANA Time Zone Database, via timeanddate.com. Checked 2026-08-23.
Roughly nine destinations, with Amsterdam the only one in Europe moves
From Johan Adolf Pengel (PBM), seven airlines fly to around nine airports, among them Amsterdam, Georgetown, Panama City, Curaçao, Aruba, Belém and Port of Spain. Amsterdam is the only European destination and the busiest route. That explains the visitor mix better than any marketing story: there is no direct link to the United Kingdom, Canada or any other European country, so travellers from there connect through Amsterdam, Miami or Panama.
Source: FlightConnections, routeoverzicht Paramaribo (PBM). Checked 2026-08-23.
About 9 hours 15 minutes, over 7,520 km moves
KLM and Surinam Airways fly the route non-stop, together around eight flights a week. Expect four or five hours of time difference working against you on the way out, and an arrival at Zanderij, 45 kilometres south of Paramaribo: that transfer takes another forty-five minutes to an hour and is the leg travellers routinely forget to plan for.
Source: FlightConnections en luchthavengegevens Johan Adolf Pengel. Checked 2026-08-23.
261,543 non-resident arrivals in 2024 moves
This is the most recent official figure, published by ABS from Korps Militaire Politie counts. Of 337,373 total arrivals in 2024, 261,543 were non-residents; the rest are returning residents of Suriname. Note what the number is and is not: it counts everyone entering who does not live here, so it includes diaspora visiting family, business travellers and day visitors crossing from Guyana and French Guiana. It is not a pure tourist count, and ABS has not been able to produce one since 2017.
Source: Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek (ABS), Verkeers- en Vervoersstatistieken 2021-2024, tabellen 1.03a en 1.14. Checked 2026-08-23.
The Netherlands: 117,537 arrivals in 2024 moves
In 2024, 117,537 arrivals held Dutch nationality, against 36,189 Guyanese and 30,873 French (which includes neighbours from French Guiana). That makes the Netherlands more than three times the next foreign nationality. Watch the denominator, because it is routinely mixed up: this is about 45 percent of the 261,543 non-resident arrivals, or about 35 percent of all 337,373 arrivals including returning residents. The reason is the air map: Amsterdam is the only city in Europe with a direct link to Paramaribo, carrying roughly half of all international seats.
Source: Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek (ABS), Verkeers- en Vervoersstatistieken 2021-2024, tabellen 1.03a en 1.14. Checked 2026-08-23.
279,000 in 2017, the last internationally comparable figure moves
The World Bank series runs to 2017 and stops there: no comparable figure has been published for 2018 or later. The trend to that year was steadily upward, from 206,000 in 2010 to 279,000 in 2017. Any more recent number in circulation is usually airport passenger volume, which is a different thing: it includes diaspora family visits, business travel and cross-border traffic. Suriname has no reliable recent tourist count. There is a more recent visitor figure from ABS: 261,543 non-resident arrivals in 2024.
Source: Wereldbank (World Bank Open Data), internationale toeristische aankomsten. Checked 2026-08-23.
93 to 94 percent, the highest share of any country on earth
The two figures you meet measure slightly different things. Suriname itself and the FAO use 93 percent, measured against total area; the World Bank arrives at 94.4 percent (2023 figure) because it measures against land area and therefore leaves out the water. Both are correct, and both make Suriname the most forested country on earth. What it means is bigger than a percentage: the country is net carbon negative, deforestation has historically stayed below 0.1 percent a year, and for a traveller it is the reason an hour’s flight from Paramaribo puts you over unbroken green with not one road or village in sight.
Source: FAO Global Forest Resources Assessment en Wereldbank (World Bank Open Data). Checked 2026-08-23.
1.6 million hectares, that is 16,000 km²
That is roughly ten percent of the entire country in one unbroken reserve, on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 2 December 2000. It protects pristine tropical rainforest from the headwaters of the Coppename into the Wilhelmina Mountains, with almost no human settlement. The best known reachable part is Voltzberg and the granite dome at Raleighvallen; going further means a boat, a charter and several days.
Source: UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Checked 2026-08-23.
Four: two rainy seasons and two dry ones
The short rainy season runs from early December to late January, the short dry season from early February to late April, the long rainy season from late April to mid-August and the long dry season from mid-August to early December. The boundaries are soft and shift from year to year, so treat them as guidance rather than a timetable. More useful for a traveller: rain here usually means a short, heavy burst late in the afternoon, not a grey day. You plan around it, you do not cancel for it.
Source: Klimaatinfo en Surinaamse meteorologische seizoensindeling. Checked 2026-08-23.
28-33 °C by day all year, with 100-300 mm of rain per month
The temperature barely shifts across the year: January and February are the coolest at 28-29 °C by day, September and October the hottest, spiking towards 35 °C. In the dry months rainfall averages 100 to 150 mm a month, in the rainy seasons roughly double that, up to around 300 mm a month in Paramaribo. Humidity, not the thermometer, is what you notice: 30 °C here sits heavier than 30 °C in southern Europe, which is why tours here start early.
Source: Klimaatinfo, klimaatgegevens Paramaribo. Checked 2026-08-23.
Seven main rivers, with the Corantijn the longest
The seven are the Corantijn, Marowijne, Suriname, Coppename, Saramacca, Nickerie and Commewijne. Sources disagree on the length of the Corantijn: about 724 km if you count the Upper Corantijn (the New River) as its headwater, about 440 km if you do not. The Marowijne runs around 610 km and forms the eastern border with French Guiana, the Corantijn the western border with Guyana. Rivers here are infrastructure rather than scenery: in the interior the dugout canoe is the road, and the Suriname River carries the Brokopondo reservoir that powers the country.
Source: Geografische naslagwerken; bronnen verschillen over de lengte van de Corantijn. Checked 2026-08-23.
The full table as ABS publishes it, transcribed from the Verkeers- en Vervoersstatistieken 2021-2024. Two traps: "French Guiana" as a nationality is only 13, because residents of French Guiana hold French nationality and appear under France. And "Suriname" is mostly returning residents, so it is not a source market.
| Nationality | Arrivals 2024 | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Netherlands | 117,537 | 34.8% |
| Suriname (mostly returning residents) | 72,582 | 21.5% |
| Guyana | 36,189 | 10.7% |
| France (incl. French Guiana) | 30,873 | 9.2% |
| Rest of the Caribbean | 18,069 | 5.4% |
| Brazil | 11,810 | 3.5% |
| China | 11,426 | 3.4% |
| United States | 9,118 | 2.7% |
| Rest of Asia | 3,761 | 1.1% |
| Trinidad | 3,551 | 1.1% |
| India | 3,139 | 0.9% |
| Rest of North and Central America | 3,101 | 0.9% |
| Rest of Europe | 2,863 | 0.8% |
| Belgium | 1,888 | 0.6% |
| Canada | 1,554 | 0.5% |
| Venezuela | 1,427 | 0.4% |
| Colombia | 1,425 | 0.4% |
| Haiti | 1,256 | 0.4% |
| Rest of South America | 1,237 | 0.4% |
| England | 1,149 | 0.3% |
| Africa | 1,043 | 0.3% |
| Germany | 1,024 | 0.3% |
| Indonesia | 908 | 0.3% |
| Oceania | 298 | 0.1% |
| Japan | 116 | 0.0% |
| French Guiana (nationality) | 13 | 0.0% |
| Unknown | 16 | 0.0% |
| Total | 337,373 | 100% |
Source: Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek (ABS), Verkeers- en Vervoersstatistieken 2021-2024, tabel 1.14, figures from Korps Militaire Politie. Checked 2026-08-23.
What 90 percent forest cover, or six kitchens within a few streets, actually means is something you only get on the ground. That is what our day tours are for.