The answer to the quiz about the country in the Americas where Muslims are the largest percentage of the population as compared to other countries is Suriname.
According to the CIA World Factbook, here are some of the population statistics for Suriname:
- Population 436,494
- Religions: Hindu 27.4%, Muslim 19.6%, Roman Catholic 22.8%, Protestant 25.2% (predominantly Moravian), indigenous beliefs 5%
- Ethnic groups: Hindustani (also known locally as “East Indians”; their ancestors emigrated from northern India in the latter part of the 19th century) 37%, Creole (mixed white and black) 31%, Javanese 15%, “Maroons” (their African ancestors were brought to the country in the 17th and 18th centuries as slaves and escaped to the interior) 10%, Amerindian 2%, Chinese 2%, white 1%, other 2%
Razib of Gene Expression was the first to email me the correct answer. Others who got it right are Dan B. and Al-Muhajabah.
Congratulations, Razib. I didn’t even get around to submitting my answer until today. I claim finals week as my excuse 😉
i keep track of the green 😉 i assume guyana is #2?
Razib: Yes.
That would have been my second guess but when I looked it up in my (out of date) World Almanac, I saw that the percentage was much lower than in Suriname so I left it out of my post.
This would also be an interesting quiz to ask people what countries in the Americas have the highest percentage of Hindus. I’d be surprised if a lot of people got that one right either.
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A-M: Only about 10% of Guyana is Muslim.
Yeah, that’s about what my old World Almanac said. I was going to include it in my comment but then left it off for that reason. I think there are also some of the countries in the Caribbean that have a large South Asian population and hence a large population of Muslims and Hindus.