EMEA is an acronym used by governments, marketers, and business officials to group the countries of Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. EMEA is used most often in situations involving international trade and business. Companies in North America frequently use EMEA when referring to the area as a whole.
The EMEA region includes more than 100 countries, whose citizens collectively speak more than two thousand native languages. The EMEA region's total population size totals between 2.1 and 2.2 billion people. The most populous country in the region is Nigeria, home to over 206 million people, while Vatican City has the lowest population of all EMEA countries at less than 1,000.
There are roughly 115 countries and 17 non-country territories in the EMEA, but that number is not definitive. Because EMEA is a general term not bound by any official legal or political definitions, the precise list of which specific countries are included in the EMEA can vary slightly depending upon the source.
For example, some sources include Russia, which stretches across both Europe and Asia, or even India (which is clearly in Asia), while others do not. Some sources include countries such as Azerbaijan and Georgia, which straddle the Europe/Asia border, while others leave them off. Finally, some sources include European overseas territories such as British Indian Ocean Territory (part of U.K.) or French Guiana (part of France), others include only those territories geographically located in the EMEA region (for example, the U.K. territory Isle of Man makes the list because it is located in Europe, but North America's British Virgin Islands do not), and still others discard them all.
The EMEA also overlaps with and/or includes a plethora of smaller country groupings and/or organizations. None of these groups comprise the entire EMEA, but all are part of the EMEA. In no particular order, these include: