Regions of Iceland

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The regions of Iceland are eight areas of Iceland that roughly follow the arrangement of parliamentary constituencies as they were between 1959 and 2003. These regions are not incorporated polities but rather recognized groupings of municipalities. Iceland only has two levels of administration, the national government and 64 municipalities. The municipalities have organized themselves into eight regional associations [1] and those boundaries are also recognized by Statistics Iceland to report statistics. [2] Since 2014, police and commissioner ( sýslumaður ) districts have followed the eight region model with the exception that Vestmannaeyjar form a special district and are not part of the South region. The divisions of Iceland for the purposes of health care and district courts diverge more from the commonly used eight region model.

Contents

The postal code system also roughly corresponds with the regions with the first digit of the three digit codes usually being the same as on the map below.

Overview

Iceland, administrative divisions - Nmbrs.svg
No.English nameNative namePopulation

(2022) [3]

Area(km2)Population density (per km2) ISO 3166-2 Number of municipalitiesLargest town
1 Capital Region Höfuðborgarsvæðið240,8821,046230.29IS-17 Reykjavík
2 Southern Peninsula Suðurnes29,10881335.80IS-24 Reykjanesbær
3 Western Region Vesturland17,0199,5271.79IS-39 Akranes
4 Westfjords Vestfirðir7,2058,8420.81IS-49 Ísafjörður
5 Northwestern Region Norðurland vestra7,40513,1080.56IS-55 Sauðárkrókur
6 Northeastern Region Norðurland eystra31,16122,6771.37IS-611 Akureyri
7 Eastern Region Austurland11,03115,7060.70IS-74 Egilsstaðir
8 Southern Region Suðurland32,43730,9831.05IS-815 Selfoss
IcelandÍsland376,248102,7023.66IS64Reykjavík

Differences from the 1959-2003 constituencies

Constituencies in use between 1959 and 2003 Islanda - Distretti elettorali.png
Constituencies in use between 1959 and 2003

Until 1957, the parliamentary constituencies used in Iceland had been based on its counties and market towns. The reform of constituency borders in 1957 would group these counties and towns together into eight larger areas that form the basis for the modern regional division of Iceland. The differences between the 1957 boundaries and the modern ones are:


See also

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References

  1. "Landshlutasamtök". Icelandic Association of Local Authorities. Retrieved 10 June 2021.
  2. "Iceland in figures 2018". Statistics Iceland. Retrieved 10 June 2021.
  3. Population by municipality, age and sex 1998-2022 - Division into municipalites [sic] as of 1 January 2022
  4. "Hornfirðingar vilja samstarf með Sunnlendingum" (in Icelandic). Morgunblaðið. 8 May 2008. Retrieved 10 June 2021.
  5. "Landsmönnum fjölgaði um 1,3% á milli ára" (in Icelandic). Statistics Iceland. 22 March 2021. Retrieved 10 June 2021.