Opole Voivodeship

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Flag of the Opole Voivodeship

Opole Voivodeship
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Coat of arms and logo
Coat of arms of the Opole Voivodeship
Logo of the Opole Voivodeship
Basic data
Capital : Opole
Voivode : Adrian Czubak
Voivodeship Marshal : Andrzej Buła
Biggest town: Opole (122,625 inhabitants)
ISO 3166-2 : PL-16
License Plate O
Residents : 984.345 June 30, 2019
Population density : 110 inhabitants per km²
geography
Area : 9,412 km²
- of which country: ? km²
- of which water: ? km²
Expansion: North-South: up to 133 km
West-East: up to 107 km
The highest point: 891  m
Deepest point: 131.5  m
Landscape structure
Forests: 27.0%
Waters: ? %
Agriculture: 62.5%
Other: ? %
Administrative division
Independent cities : 1
Counties : 11
Municipalities total: 71
- Municipalities: 3
- urban / rural district: 31
- rural communities: 37
Woj opolskie adm german translation.png
Government building of the Opole Voivodeship in Opole

The Opole Voivodeship , in German also Opole Voivodeship ( Polish województwo opolskie ), with the capital Opole is one of the 16 voivodeships of the Republic of Poland . It covers the western part of Upper Silesia , the region around Opole, supplemented by the former Lower Silesian districts of Brzeg and Namysłów . An Opole Voivodeship was created for the first time in 1950; the administrative reforms in 1975 and 1999 resulted in border corrections and territorial exchanges. Today's Opole Voivodeship emerged from the Voivodeship of the same name that existed from 1975 to 1998 .

The Opole Voivodeship is the center of the German minority in Poland , which with its election committee has been involved in the administration of the Sejmik there since 1998 .

coat of arms

Description : In blue, a completely golden crowned eagle .

Administrative division

The Opole Voivodeship is divided into 11 administrative districts ( Powiaty ), the city of Opole being a district. There is also a district under her name, but the city does not belong to it.

One district cities

  1. Opole ( Opole ) - 128.208

Counties ( Powiaty )

  1. Brzeg ( Brieg ) - 90054
  2. Głubczyce ( Leobschütz ) - 45,679
  3. Kędzierzyn-Koźle ( Kandrzin-Cosel ) - 94,135
  4. Kluczbork ( Kreuzburg OS ) - 65,644
  5. Krapkowice ( Krappitz ) - 63,857
  6. Namysłów ( Namslau ) - 42,692
  1. Nysa ( Neisse ) - 136,393
  2. Olesno ( Rosenberg OS ) - 64,411
  3. Opole ( Opole ) - 123,487
  4. Prudnik ( Neustadt OS ) - 55,325
  5. Strzelce Opolskie ( Groß Strehlitz ) - 74,460

(Residents on June 30, 2019)

The largest districts in the voivodeship are Opole and Nysa.

geography

landscape

The Opole Voivodeship is located in the south-western part of Poland in the vicinity of the Lower Silesian , Silesian , Łódź and Greater Poland Voivodeships . In the south it has a 185 km long state border with the Czech Republic . The landscape is mostly flat. It is part of the Silesian Plain. Low mountain ranges can only be found in the south-west (Sudeten foreland), in the east (Silesian plateau) and in the north-east (Wielun plateau). The highest point in the region is the Bischofskoppe (Biskupia Kopa) with 891 m on the border with the Czech Republic. The Oder forms a border between the south-west, which is characterized by agriculture, and the north-east, which is dominated by forestry.

climate

The voivodeship is characterized by a continental climate with warm summers and cold winters. The average temperature in January is -3 ° C and in July 18.5 ° C. The annual average temperature is 8.5 ° C. The annual average number of days with precipitation varies between 160 and 180. The annual average snow cover in the voivodeship varies between 40 and 60 days and increases from west to east. The average annual precipitation is 650 mm.

Biggest cities

The only major city in the voivodeship is the provincial capital Opole.

city German name Residents
June 30, 2019
Opole Opole 128.208
Kędzierzyn-Koźle Kandrzin-Cosel 60,852
Nysa Neisse 43,849
Brzeg Brieg 35,890
Kluczbork Kreuzburg 23,554
Prudnik Neustadt OS 21,041
Strzelce Opolskie Groß Strehlitz 17,900
Krapkowice Krappitz 16.301
Namysłów Namslau 16,551
Głuchołazy Bad goat neck 13,534
Głubczyce Leobschütz 12,552
Zdzieszowice Deschowitz 11,445
Olesno Rosenberg OS 9374

Rivers

history

The heart of the voivodeship: Opole
The voivodeship from 1975 to 1998
Monument to the Preservation of Voivodeship on Plac Wolności (Opole) in Opole

Until 1945 this region was part of the Prussian province of Upper Silesia . After the Second World War in 1946 it was merged with the Silesian Voivodeship. In 1950 the Opole Voivodeship emerged from a regional reform . From what was then the Lower Silesian Voivodeship, the districts of Brzeg and Namysłów were incorporated into the new voivodeship. In a third realignment of 1975 were circuit Racibórz the Katowice Province and a part of the circle Olesno the Częstochowa Province connected. In a fourth territorial reform of 1999, which had the aim of creating historical voivodeships, the Opole Voivodeship was to be dissolved according to plans by the Polish government. The western part with the districts of Brzeg and Namysłów was to be ceded to the Lower Silesian Voivodeship and the greater part of the Voivodeship was to form the Silesian Voivodeship together with the Katowice Voivodeship and part of the Częstochowa Voivodeship. The population of the Opole Voivodeship put up an enormous resistance to these government plans, as the formation of the Silesian Voivodeship would mean that the German minority's influence in the state government would disappear. The resistance was not only supported by the German minority from the region, but also by the Polish Silesians and Poles , who feel connected to their voivodeship. With the dissolution of the Częstochowa Voivodeship in 1999, the Powiat Oleski was again incorporated into the Opole Voivodeship after 24 years. In 2006 Radlau also became the first officially bilingual municipality in the voivodeship and introduced German as the second official language .

politics

In Opole Voivodeship, there is an elected voivodship seymik and voivodeship marshal and a government-appointed voivod.

Voivodeship Seemik

Since the 2018 election, the Voivodship Sejmik has been composed as follows:

Voivodeship Seemik Opole
Election committee Mandates
Citizens' Coalition (KO)
13/30
Law and Justice (PiS)
10/30
German minority (election committee)
5/30
Polish People's Party (PSL)
2/30

Voivodeship Marshal

Andrzej Buła ( PO ) has been voivodship marshal since 2014 .

population

St. Annaberg ( Góra Świętej Anny )
Town hall in Brzeg (Brieg)

1950

When the Opole Voivodeship was founded in 1950, 870,000 people lived here. The population living here was made up of three different groups in 1950:

1950s to 1990s - local population emigration

Due to the emigration of the autochthonous population, who moved to the Federal Republic as repatriates , their share of the total population in the voivodeship fell continuously:

  • 1950 approx. 55% autochthonous population
  • 1965 approx. 44% autochthonous population
  • 1977 approx. 38% autochthonous population
  • 1989 <30% autochthonous population
  • 1990s approx. 20% autochthonous population

Beginning of the 21st century

The 2002 census showed the following for the Opole Voivodeship:

nationality votes cast in percent
Polish 869,300 81.62%
German 106,900 10.04%
no 62,400 5.86%
Silesian ¹ 24,200 2.27%
Roma 900 0.08%
Ukrainian 300 0.03%
Russian 100 0.01%
other 900 0.08%
nationality votes cast in percent
only polish 858.487 80.61%
polish and german 154.050 14.46%
no 45,525 4.27%
polish and others 3,745 0.35%
only German 2,562 0.24%
other 656 0.06%

¹ Silesian is not recognized as a nationality , but this term was used in the 2002 census

Sources for the tables:

Population development

  • 1975 - 971,300
  • 1980 - 975,000
  • 1985 - 1,013,700
  • 1990 - 1,018,600
  • 1995 - 1,025,200
  • 1998 - 1,022,100
  • 2000 - 1,070,598 (connection of the Powiat Oleski in 1999)
  • 2004 - 1,055,667
  • 2006 - 1,041,941
  • 2007 - 1,037,088 ( without Powiat Oleski approx. 969,380 )
  • 2011 - 1,016,213
  • 2019 - 984,345 (June 30, 2019)

religion

Most of the voivodeship's residents are baptized Roman Catholics . The next largest religious communities are the Protestant churches and Jehovah's Witnesses . The remaining residents belong to other small faiths or are non-denominational.

In the Diocese of Opole , which is not identical to the territory of the Opole Voivodeship, around 794,000 belonged to the Roman Catholic faith in 2016. Parts of the districts of Brzeg and Namysłów do not belong to the diocese, but also the district of Racibórz in the Silesian Voivodeship. The Evangelical-Augsburg Church is the largest group of Protestants. The faithful of the Opole Voivodeship belong to the Katowice diocese and in 2008 numbered 1,600 people (0.15%). It is followed by Pentecostal supporters with 1,081 members (0.1%) and numerous smaller Protestant churches. In 2010, Jehovah's Witnesses had 3,158 members (0.3%).

The percentages are based on the population of 1,029,894 in 2010 and 2008.

language

In the Opole Voivodeship, mainly Polish (see also Polish Silesian ) and sometimes German (see also German Silesian ) is spoken. In the larger cities of the voivodeship and in the southwest, the Polish language dominates, in the countryside and in the east of the voivodeship, Polish and German Silesian dominate. In 28 municipalities, the proportion of the German-speaking population exceeds 20%. German is the official auxiliary language in 14 of these communities. In 2006, Radlau was the first municipality in Poland to set up bilingual place-name signs . In the meantime, other parishes have followed. The use of the German language and the Silesian dialect was forbidden until the fall of the Wall and was punished as an offense. As a result, many Silesian German or Silesian dialect have not at all or only after 1990 learned. Most of the inhabitants of the voivodeship speak both the Silesian dialect (in everyday life) and the standard Polish language (at work). The older generation and the younger generation who can learn German at school are proficient in German. According to the results of the last census (2002), 84% of the population speak Polish at home and 8.3% German.

Economy and Infrastructure

Regional train at Opole Główne station
Hard coal coking plant in Zdzieszowice (Deschowitz)

The Opole Voivodeship is one of the poorer regions in Poland. Compared with the GDP of the EU expressed in purchasing power standards , the province reached 2,015 an index of 55 (EU-28 = 100). With a value of 0.832, Opole ranks 11th among the 16 Voivodeships of Poland in the Human Development Index .

Most of the workforce is employed in the tertiary sector (40.1%), 30% in the primary sector and 29.9% in the secondary sector. In the period from 2001 to 2003, more than 10,000 jobs were cut in the secondary sector. The official unemployment rate in December 2009 was 12.6 percent.

Many work abroad, mainly in Germany and the Netherlands.

Agriculture

The Opole Voivodeship represents 3.2% of the total agricultural area in Poland. One of the most fertile soils in the region is the loess- grown black earth that is found in the south-west of the Voivodeship. The soils of the voivodeship are among the most productive in Poland. Mainly sugar beet, grain, rapeseed and potatoes are grown.

Industry

The expansion of industry in the voivodeship is mainly limited to cities and the southern section of the Oder from Krapkowice to Kędzierzyn-Koźle . The largest industrial centers can be found in the Opole area and in the Kędzierzyńsko-Kozielski powiat . The dominant industrial sectors in the voivodeship include the fuel industry (hard coal coke in Zdzieszowice ), electrical engineering, construction (cement, lime), the mineral, chemical, automotive and furniture industries, as well as the food industry. The main focus of the chemical industry is in the powiat Kędzierzyńsko-Kozielski. The extraction of natural resources for the construction industry is most widespread in the center of the voivodeship. The industry is very diverse in the city of Opole and the surrounding area.

tourism

Among the tourist attractions of the voivodeship are cities such as Opole, Brzeg , Nysa , Paczków and Głogówek , the pilgrimage site of Góra Świętej Anny (St. Annaberg) and numerous castles in the region. The Jezioro Nyskie and the Jeziora Turawskie are also of touristic importance .

Public facilities

The Opole fire brigade provides fire protection and general assistance in its urban area and in the voivodeship. There is a large fire brigade complex in Opole, which consists of a professional fire brigade including water rescue , the voivodship command with the fire department school and the district command.

literature

Ryszard Emmerling, Urszula Zajaczkowska: Opole - The capital of the voivodeship. Schlesischer Verlag ADAN, Opole 2003, ISBN 83-915371-3-7

Web links

Commons : Opole Voivodeship  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Premier Beata Szydło powołała nowych wojewodów. www.premier.gov.pl, accessed February 15, 2017 (Polish).
  2. ^ Website of the Opole Voivodeship, Skład Zarządu , accessed on May 27, 2014
  3. population. Size and Structure by Territorial Division. As of June 30, 2019. Główny Urząd Statystyczny (GUS) (PDF files; 0.99 MiB), accessed December 24, 2019 .
  4. http://umwo.opole.pl/serwis/index.php?id=22
  5. The origins of today's inhabitants of Silesia. Society for interregional cultural exchange - Berlin / Stowarzyszenie Instytut Śląskie - Opole, archived from the original on June 8, 2018 ; accessed on May 23, 2018 .
  6. ^ Result of the 2011 census, Główny Urząd Statystyczny, population figures of the municipalities as of March 31, 2011 ( memento of March 28, 2014 in the Internet Archive ), July 2012
  7. population. Size and Structure by Territorial Division. As of June 30, 2019. Główny Urząd Statystyczny (GUS) (PDF files; 0.99 MiB), accessed December 24, 2019 .
  8. Statistical Office of the Opole Voivodeship: Choice of Religion ( Memento of October 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 122 kB)
  9. Polish Statistical Office: Religions and Nationalities in Poland 2006–2008 (PDF; 3 MB)
  10. Statistical Office of the Opole Voivodeship: Inhabitants ( Memento of October 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 112 kB)
  11. ^ Franz-Josef Sehr : Professor from Poland in Beselich annually for decades . In: Yearbook for the Limburg-Weilburg district 2020 . The district committee of the district of Limburg-Weilburg, Limburg-Weilburg 2019, ISBN 3-927006-57-2 , p. 223-228 .
  12. Eurostat: Four regions over double the EU average. European Commission, March 30, 2017, accessed January 7, 2019 .
  13. ^ Sub-national HDI - Area Database - Global Data Lab. Retrieved August 12, 2018 .
  14. Central Statistics Office of Poland (CIS), Bezrobotni oraz stopa bezrobocia wg województw, grudzień 2009 , February 3, 2010 ( Memento from April 2, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  15. ^ Franz-Josef Sehr : BF Oppeln: The fire brigade on the Oder . In: Florian Hessen 1/1989 . Munkelt Verlag, Wiesbaden 1989, p. 32-34 . ISSN 0936-5370 .  

Coordinates: 50 ° 39 '  N , 17 ° 54'  E