Eastern Province ( rw, Intara y'Iburasirazuba; french: Province de l'Est; nl, Oostelijke Provincie) is the largest, the most populous and the least densely populated of Rwanda's five

provinces A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman '' provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

. It was created in early January 2006 as part of a government decentralization program that re-organized the country's local government structures. It has seven districts: Bugesera, Gatsibo,

Kayonza Kayonza is a small town in Kayonza district, Eastern Province, Rwanda. The town is centred on a roundabout, where the road east from Kigali splits into the road running north to the Ugandan border, and the road south to Tanzania. It is a major ...

, Ngoma,

Kirehe Kirehe is a district (''akarere'') in Eastern Province, Rwanda. Its capital is Kirehe town (which is usually known as Rusumo, being the major settlement of the former Rusumo district). Geography The district comprises areas in the far south-e ...

Nyagatare Nyagatare is a town in the North East of Rwanda. With a population of more than 100,000, it is one of the most populous settlements in the Eastern Province along with Rwamagana and Kibungo. Location Nyagatare is located in Nyagatare District, ...

and

Rwamagana Rwamagana is a city and capital of both the Rwamagana District and the Eastern Province in Rwanda Description Rwamagana lies approximately from Kigali, on the newly renovated road leading east towards Tanzania. There was formerly a large am ...

. The capital city of the Eastern Province is

. The Eastern Province comprises the former provinces of

Kibungo Kibungo is a town in the Republic of Rwanda. It is the political, administrative and commercial capital of Ngoma District. In 1998, Kibungo became the site of at least four of Rwanda's last 22 executions. All of the convicts were executed for cri ...

and

Umutara Until January 2006, Umutara Province was one of the 12 provinces of Rwanda, provinces (''intara'') of Rwanda. However, due to local government reorganization, this area is now part of the new larger Eastern Province, Rwanda, Eastern Province. Th ...

, most of Kigali Rural, and part of

Byumba Byumba is a city in northern Rwanda, and is the capital of Gicumbi District. It is home to an SOS Children's Village. The city lies about , north of the capital Kigali. This location lies approximately , south of the International border with U ...

. The

Akagera National Park Akagera National Park is a protected area in eastern Rwanda covering along the international border with Tanzania. It was founded in 1934 and includes savannah, montane and swamp habitats. The park is named for the Kagera River which flows alo ...

is situated is this province.

History

It is not known when the territory of present day Rwanda was first inhabited, but it is thought that humans moved into the area following the last ice age either in the

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several p ...

period, around ten thousand years ago, or in the long humid period which followed, up to around 3000 BC.Briggs and Booth 2006 p6 Archaeological excavations have revealed evidence of sparse settlement by

hunter gatherer A traditional hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living an ancestrally derived lifestyle (sociology), lifestyle in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local sources, especially edible wild plants bu ...

s in the late Stone Age, followed by a larger population of early

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostl ...

settlers, who produced dimpled

pottery Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and ...

and iron tools. By the 17th century it is thought that most of Rwanda was inhabited, with a fairly even spread of population across the hills of the country.Vansina p16
/ref>

List of the Eastern Province Districts by Population (2012)

Notes and references

Cited texts

* Briggs, Philip & Booth, Janice (2006) ''Rwanda - The Bradt Travel Guide''. 3rd ed. London: Bradt Travel Guides. * Chrétien, Jean-Pierre (2003) ''The Great Lakes of Africa: Two Thousand Years of History'' Hardcover ed. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. * Dorsey, Learthen (1994) ''Historical Dictionary of Rwanda''. Scarecrow Press. * Ministry of Local Government, Republic of Rwanda (MINALOC):
Eastern Province
. ''Performance contracts in Year 2009-2010 (July 2009-June 2010)''. Accessed 2010-03-11. * Munyakazi, Augustine & Ntagaramba, Johnson Funga (2005). ''Atlas of Rwanda'' French ed. Oxford: Macmillan Education.

Area calculation

* Pixel sizes for provinces taken from traced maps:

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. Etymology The word ''north ...

= 28,547;

East East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fac ...

= 81,548; South = 50,844;

West West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...

= 51,798; Kigali = 6,129 * Total Pixel size for Rwanda = 28,547 + 81,548 + 50,844 + 51,798 + 6,129 = 218,866 * => Eastern Province % of total area: 81,548 / 218,866 = 37.26% * Total area of Rwanda = **
Rwanda
. ''The World Facebook''. United States Central Intelligence Agency. 4 March 2010. Accessed 11 March 2010. * => Area of Eastern Province = x 37.26% =

External links

Eastern Province official website
{{Coord, 1, 45, S, 30, 30, E, display=title, region:RW_type:adm1st_source:GNS-enwiki Provinces of Rwanda States and territories established in 2006