The Wal-Mart World: Population nearly 2 Million Employees throughout the world...and still growing

Wal-Mart Stores plans to hire up to 150,000 employees in China over the next five years, five times the number of workers it currently has there, as it expands its number of stores, the company said Monday.

Wal-Mart now has 56 stores in China, with about 30,000 employees, and plans to open 20 stores this year. Amy Wyatt, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman, declined to say how many stores would be added longer term.

Internationally, Wal-Mart is active in China, Japan, Korea, Britain, Germany, Canada, Mexico and eight countries in Latin America.

The company does not provide a country-by-country breakdown of international financial results, but the division accounted for about 20 percent of last year's overall net sales of $312.4 billion. The international unit is growing faster than the company's larger United States operations.

Late last year, Wal-Mart extended its global business by buying 140 Sonae stores in Brazil and increasing its stake to a majority in the Seiyu chain in Japan, which has 405 stores.

Forbes.com has created a slide show to illustrate the globalization of Wal-Mart, it is a very eye opening and awakening presentation that you must check out! Heres the link Forbes: Globalization of Wal-Mart