Ruse Province (Bulgarian: Област Русе, romanized: Oblast Ruse), or Rusenska Oblast (Bulgarian: Русенска област, former name Ruse okrug) is a province in northern Bulgaria, named after its main city, Ruse, neighbouring Romania via the Danube. It is divided into 8 municipalities with a total population, as of February 2011, of 235,252 inhabitants.[2][3][4]
The Danube Bridge, one of only two bridges opened over the Danube, is located in the province. One of the versions of a folk song, inspired by the Ruse blood wedding, can be heard in the province.
Municipalities within Ruse Province with their administrative centres
The Ruse province (област, oblast) contains eight municipalities (община, obshtina; plural общини, obshtini). The following table shows the names of each municipality in English and Cyrillic, the main town (in bold) or village, and the population of each as of December 2009.
The Ruse province had a population of 266,213 (266,157 also given) according to a 2001 census, of which 48.7% were male and 51.3% were female.[7]
As of the end of 2009, the population of the province, announced by the Bulgarian National Statistical Institute, numbered 249,144[2] of which 25.8% are inhabitants aged over 60 years.[8]
The following table represents the change of the population in the province after World War II:
Ruse Province
Year
1946
1956
1965
1975
1985
1992
2001
2005
2007
2009
2011
Population
215,361
236,117
273,226
305,722
315,762
290,800
266,213
256,835
253,008
249,144
235,252
Sources: National Statistical Institute,[2] „Census 2001“,[3] „Census 2011“,[4] „pop-stat.mashke.org“,??
Ethnic groups according to the 2001 census, when 266,157 people of the population of 266,213 of Rousse Province identified themselves (with percentage of total population):[11]
