Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur engineering and business schools. All these institutions of higher learning help contribute to the human capital needed by the region to meet current technological challenges. The region has a total GDP (2012) of €142.4 billion (US $183.1 bn), the third highest in France. It has a per capita GDP of €28,861 (US $37,121), slightly higher than the French average. According to a recent survey, a person living in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur has an average annual income of about €37,489 (US $45,755). The region is one of the most visited of France, and has therefore many well-known museums, mostly in Marseille: the
Alpes-de-Haute-Provence character, with a transition between the snow regime of the high valleys and the mediterranean rainfall regime in the lower mountains and below. The summer low water levels are severe and violent floods occur when heavy rains fall which is often in autumn. The Durance, Verdon, Bléone and Buëch have had the construction of several dams and the diversion of parts of the river for irrigation and power generation in the 20th century. The climate of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence department is a Mediterranean climate degrading by altitude and latitude. In fact, while in the lower valleys and flat lands of Haute-Provence