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Province - Current provinces

Province - Current provinces: Encyclopedia II - Province - Current provinces

Not all "second-level" polities are termed provinces. In Arab countries the secondary level of government, called a muhfazah, is usually translated as a governorate. This term is also used for the historic Russian guberniyas, (compare to modern-day oblast). In Poland, the equivalent of province is województwo, often translated as voivodeship. In Peru, provinces are a tertiary unit of government, as the country is divided into twenty-five regions, ...

Province: Encyclopedia II - Province - Current provinces

Province - Current provinces

Not all "second-level" polities are termed provinces. In Arab countries the secondary level of government, called a muhfazah, is usually translated as a governorate. This term is also used for the historic Russian guberniyas, (compare to modern-day oblast). In Poland, the equivalent of province is województwo, often translated as voivodeship.

In Peru, provinces are a tertiary unit of government, as the country is divided into twenty-five regions, which are then subdivided into 194 provinces.

There are also provinces in New Zealand, but the country is not seen as a "federal" country. However, the provinces do have a few duties like collecting rates and each province has its own Health Board and District Prisons Board.

Some provinces are as large and populous as nations. The most populous province is Henan, China, pop. 93,000,000. Also very populous are several other Chinese provinces, as well as Punjab, Pakistan, pop. 85,000,000.

The largest provinces by area are Xinjiang, China (1,600,000 sq. km) and Quebec, Canada (1,500,000 sq. km).

The term governorate is widely used in Arab countries to describe an administrative unit; it translates the Arabic word muhafazah. Some governorates combine more than one wilaya; others closely follow traditional boundaries inherited from the Ottoman Empire's vilayet system.