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Geographical Information
Area - 31,900 sq. km.
Population 3,900,000
The oblast is located in the forest/steppe and steppe zones of the southeastern part of Ukraine. Its administrative Centre is Dnipropetrovsk. The oblast's territory, occupying 5.3% of the total area of Ukraine, is represented by a plain relief of the steppe character with the developed river network, high fertile land. The moderate continental climate contributes to the development of agriculture, especially grain growing.
84% of the oblast's population lives in cities and towns, including 56% of those able to work.
The oblast is divided into 22 administrative districts, with 13 towns, 54 urban villages, 1,449 villages. The largest cities and towns are Dnipropetrovsk, (1,200,000), Kryvy Rih, (789,000), Dniprodzerzhynsk, (375,000), Nikopol, (56,000), Pavlohrad, (163,000).
The oblast is rich in mineral resources. Its share in Ukraine's volume of the extraction of manganese ore is 100%, iron ore, about 80%, coal, 13.5%. The deposits of uranium, titanium, zirconium and rutile ilmenite ores, fire clays, limes, granite, building stone, sand are under exploitation. The reserves of nickel and talc magnesite ores, dolomite, bauxite, brown coal, gold, sources of mineral waters with high level of mineralization have been explored.
Background
In 16-18th centuries, the territory of the Dnipropetrovsk oblast was included into the lands of the Zaporizhian Cossack Army. Five out of eight Zaporizhian Siches were located in the oblast's territory. The residents of the oblast are proud of the fact that one of the first democratic republics to appear in Europe and last for centuries was the Zaporizhian Sich.
The oblast's rapid development started since the second half of the 19th century and was explained by equidistant equal distance from the Kryvy Rih iron ore deposits and Donbas coal fields. In that period the oblast became the largest metal manufacturer. The second stage of industrial growth started in post war years when machine building, aerospace industry, chemical and power engineering began to build up.
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Industry
The Dnipropetrovsk oblast is a large industrial Centre. Over 40% of Ukraine's ferrous metallurgy produce is manufactured here, as well as about 70% of tubes, 30% of rolled metal, 28% of coke, 17% of the produce of chemical and oil and chemical industry, 7% of electric power engineering, 9% of machine building produce. Machine building industry specializes in manufacturing the following produce: metallurgical, mining shaft, processing equipment, heavy presses, electric locomotives, tractors, beet harvesting combines, trolley buses, refrigerators, TV sets.
Agriculture
The oblast area makes up 3,192,000 ha including 82.3% of the agricultural land. Arable land consists mainly of black earth. The oblast share part in agricultural produce of Ukraine makes up 6% of grain, 14% of sunflower, 5% of butter and 10.5% of vegetable oil. More than 500 large agrarian and around 2,000 cattle breeding are found in the oblast.
Transport and communications
Due to the favorable geographical location of the oblast, it has a well developed transport system. The freight turnover of all transport types makes up 10% of the total Ukrainian one. The length of railways is 1,580 km, 79% of them have been electrified. The length of motor roads is 8,300 km. The total annual freight turnover exceeds 300 million tons, passenger transportation, over 60 million people. The length of navigable part of the Dnipro river and its tributaries in the oblast's territory is 300 km. The average navigation period lasts for 247 days a year. The ports of Dnipropetrovsk and Dniprodzerzhynsk can serve vessels of the river sea class with the water tonnage of up to 3,000. There are three airports in the oblast, two of them suitable for international transportation: in Dnipropetrovsk and Kryvy Rih.
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Foreign economic relations
The Dnipropetrovsk oblast has a high export/import potential. In 1996, the oblast was second in exports and first in imports. Foreign trade turnover made up 5.9 billion dollars, including 2.5 billion dollars of export and 3.4 billion dollars of import. Russia remains the major foreign economic partner of the oblast: 31.5% of export and 23.6% of import, then follow the Great Britain, Switzerland and the USA.
The oblast's basic export potential is the produce of the enterprises of the ferrous metallurgy, machine building, chemical, coal and mining industries. The oblast imports mainly natural gas, oil products, machine building products, and raw materials for chemical industry. In 1996, the oblast had a negative balance of foreign trade: over $ 920 million (Hr 1.7 billion), mainly due to supplies of Russian and Turkmen gas further delivered all over Ukraine.
The oblast shows deep market transformations. In 1996, privatization involved 1,625 companies, including 1,351 enterprises of small privatization and 235 projects of uncompleted construction.
By the amount of foreign investments mobilized, the oblast holds the fourth place in Ukraine. At the beginning of 1997, 293 enterprises obtained investments from 320 investors of 46 countries, which amounted to $ 99.3 million, however the actual demand to support investment projects exceeds $ 5 billion.0 |
