Poltava Oblast (), also referred to as Poltavshchyna (), is an

oblast An oblast ( or ) is a type of administrative division in Bulgaria and several post-Soviet states, including Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. Historically, it was used in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. The term ''oblast'' is often translated i ...

(province) of central

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

. The

administrative center An administrative centre is a seat of regional administration or local government, or a county town, or the place where the central administration of a commune, is located. In countries with French as the administrative language, such as Belgiu ...

of the oblast is the city of

Poltava Poltava (, ; , ) is a city located on the Vorskla, Vorskla River in Central Ukraine, Central Ukraine. It serves as the administrative center of Poltava Oblast as well as Poltava Raion within the oblast. It also hosts the administration of Po ...

. Most of its territory was part of the southern regions of the

Cossack Hetmanate The Cossack Hetmanate (; Cossack Hetmanate#Name, see other names), officially the Zaporozhian Host (; ), was a Ukrainian Cossacks, Cossack state. Its territory was located mostly in central Ukraine, as well as in parts of Belarus and southwest ...

. Population: Three other important cities in the oblast are Horishni Plavni,

Kremenchuk Kremenchuk (; , , also spelt Kremenchug, ) is an industrial city in central Ukraine which stands on the banks of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. The city serves as the administrative center of Kremenchuk Raion and Kremenchuk urban hromada within ...

, and Lubny.

History

The Poltava Oblast was established on 22 September 1937 by a resolution of the

Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union The Central Executive Committee of the USSR (), which may be abbreviated as the CEC (), was the supreme governing body of the USSR in between sessions of the All-Union Congress of Soviets from 1922 to 1938. The Central Executive Committee elec ...

. It was based mostly on rayons (districts) that were part of

Kharkiv Oblast Kharkiv Oblast (, ), also referred to as Kharkivshchyna (), is an oblast (province) in eastern Ukraine. Kharkiv borders Luhansk Oblast to the east, Donetsk Oblast to the southeast, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast to the southwest, Poltava Oblast to the w ...

, with some from

Kyiv Oblast Kyiv Oblast (, ), also called Kyivshchyna (, ), is an Administrative divisions of Ukraine, oblast (province) in central and northern Ukraine. It surrounds, but does not include, the city of Kyiv, which is administered as a city with special sta ...

. The region approximately corresponds to the earlier

Poltava Governorate Poltava Governorate was an administrative-territorial unit (''guberniya'') of the Russian Empire. It was officially created in 1802 from the disbanded Little Russia Governorate (1796–1802), Little Russia Governorate and had its capital in Polt ...

(1802–1925). During the

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

occupation in 1941–43, most of the region belonged to Kiew Generalbezirke (general district), while the rest was part of the German military rear area. After the withdrawal of German forces, the region was reinstated almost to the same borders. In the 1950s it lost some of its territories to Kyiv Oblast and the newly created Cherkasy Oblast. Some were submerged with the creation of the Kremenchuk Reservoir in 1959. In 2020, as part of a general Ukrainian administrative reform, Poltava Oblast reduced the number of its raions by increasing them in size. During the

Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

, the town of Myrhorod was bombed. However, there has been no ground fighting and the province remains completely under Ukrainian control.

Geography

Poltava Oblast is situated in the central part of Ukraine. Located on the left bank of the

Dnieper The Dnieper or Dnepr ( ), also called Dnipro ( ), is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. Approximately long, with ...

, the Poltava region was part of the

. It has an area of 28,800 km². The oblast borders Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Kirovohrad, Cherkasy and Kyiv oblasts. The oblast does not contain any notable landforms apart from the Dnieper river, the land is gently undulating.

Demographics

According to the 2001 Ukrainian census, ethnic Ukrainians accounted for 91.4% of the population of Poltava Oblast, and

ethnic Russians Russians ( ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group native to Eastern Europe. Their mother tongue is Russian language, Russian, the most spoken Slavic languages, Slavic language. The majority of Russians adhere to Eastern Orthodox Church ...

for 7.2%. , its

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

was 1,400,000 and

population density Population density (in agriculture: Standing stock (disambiguation), standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geog ...

was 49 people per 1 km².

Language

Due to the Russification of Ukraine during the Soviet era, the share of Ukrainian speakers in the population of Poltava Oblast gradually decreased, while the share of Russian speakers increased. Native language of the population of Poltava Oblast according to the results of population censuses: Native language of the population of the raions, cities and city councils of Poltava Oblast according to the 2001 Ukrainian census: Ukrainian is the only official language on the whole territory of Poltava Oblast. According to a poll conducted by ''

Rating A rating is an evaluation or assessment of something, in terms of a metric (e.g. quality, quantity, a combination of both,...). Rating or rating system may also refer to: Business and economics * Credit rating, estimating the credit worthiness ...

'' from 16 November to 10 December 2018 as part of the project «Portraits of Regions», 80% of the residents of Poltava Oblast believed that the Ukrainian language should be the only state language on the entire territory of Ukraine. 9% believed that Ukrainian should be the only state language, while Russian should be the second official language in some regions of the country. 8% believed that Russian should become the second state language of the country. 3% found it difficult to answer. On 3 December 2024, Poltava Oblast Council approved the «Programme for the Development and Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language in All Spheres of Public Life in Poltava Oblast for 2025—2030», the main objectives of which are to strengthen the positions of the Ukrainian language in various spheres of public life in the oblast and to Ukrainianize the refugees from other regions of Ukraine. According to the research of the ''Content Analysis Centre'', conducted from 15 August to 15 September 2024, the topic of which was the ratio of Ukrainian and Russian languages in the Ukrainian segment of

social media Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the Content creation, creation, information exchange, sharing and news aggregator, aggregation of Content (media), content (such as ideas, interests, and other forms of expression) amongs ...

, 76.0% of posts from Poltava Oblast were written in Ukrainian (63.9% in 2023, 60.0% in 2022, 15.5% in 2020), while 24.0% were written in Russian (36.1% in 2023, 40.0% in 2022, 84.5% in 2020). After Ukraine declared independence in 1991, Poltava Oblast, as well as Ukraine as a whole, experienced a gradual

Ukrainization Ukrainization or Ukrainisation ( ) is a policy or practice of increasing the usage and facilitating the development of the Ukrainian language and promoting other elements of Ukrainian culture in various spheres of public life such as education, ...

of the education system, which had been Russified during the Soviet era. Dynamics of the ratio of the languages of instruction in general secondary education institutions in Poltava Oblast: According to the

State Statistics Service of Ukraine State Statistics Committee of Ukraine (, ''Derzhavnyi Komitet Statystyky Ukrainy'') is the government agency responsible for collection and dissemination of statistics in Ukraine. For brevity, it was also referred to as ''Derzhkomstat''. In 2010, ...

, in the 2023—2024 school year, all 134,575 pupils in general secondary education institutions in Poltava Oblast were studying in classes where Ukrainian was the language of instruction.

Age structure

: ''0–14 years:'' 13.2% (male 99,444/female 93,949) : ''15–64 years:'' 69.9% (male 483,389/female 530,911) : ''65 years and over:'' 16.9% (male 81,435/female 164,861) (2013 official)

Median age

: ''total:'' 41.4 years : ''male:'' 38.0 years : ''female:'' 44.7 years (2013 official)

Points of interest

The following historic-cultural sites were nominated for the Seven Wonders of Ukraine: *Gogol Museum-Reserve *Kotliarevsky Museum and Manor *Saint Nicholas Church * Poltava Museum of Local Lore * Exaltation of the Holy Cross Monastery Other points of interest include the site of the Battle of Poltava and the Bilsk hillfort. Opishnia is a centre for the production of decorative ceramics and is the location of the .

Economy

Industry

The oblast is a center of Ukraine's oil and

natural gas Natural gas (also fossil gas, methane gas, and gas) is a naturally occurring compound of gaseous hydrocarbons, primarily methane (95%), small amounts of higher alkanes, and traces of carbon dioxide and nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide and helium ...

industry, with many

well A well is an excavation or structure created on the earth by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The ...

s and

pipeline A pipeline is a system of Pipe (fluid conveyance), pipes for long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas, typically to a market area for consumption. The latest data from 2014 gives a total of slightly less than of pipeline in 120 countries ...

s situated here. There is a major

oil refinery An oil refinery or petroleum refinery is an industrial processes, industrial process Factory, plant where petroleum (crude oil) is transformed and refining, refined into products such as gasoline (petrol), diesel fuel, Bitumen, asphalt base, ...

plant Plants are the eukaryotes that form the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly Photosynthesis, photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with c ...

in the city of

. Important

iron ore Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the f ...

processing facilities also present. In general, there are 374 large industrial organization and 618 small industrial organizations.

Agriculture

In 1999 the gross grain yield was about 14,529 thousand tons, sugar beets – 1,002,900 tons, sunflower seeds – 166,200 tons, potatoes – 279,900 tons. The oblast also produced 120,500 tons of meat, 645,900 tons of milk and 423,200,00 eggs. At the beginning of 1999 there were 1,311 registered farms in the region.

Administrative divisions

The oblast is divided into 4 districts and 60

hromada In Ukraine, a hromada () is the main type of municipality and the third level Administrative divisions of Ukraine, local self-government in Ukraine. The current hromadas were established by the Cabinet of ministers of Ukraine, Government of Uk ...

s. The local administration of the oblast is controlled by the Poltava Oblast Rada. The governor of the oblast is the Poltava Oblast Rada speaker, appointed by the

President of Ukraine The president of Ukraine (, ) is the head of state of Ukraine. The president represents the nation in international relations, administers the foreign political activity of the state, conducts negotiations and concludes international treaties. ...

. The following data incorporates the number of each type of administrative divisions of the Poltava Oblast: *Administrative centre – 1 (

) * Raions – 4 **

Hromada In Ukraine, a hromada () is the main type of municipality and the third level Administrative divisions of Ukraine, local self-government in Ukraine. The current hromadas were established by the Cabinet of ministers of Ukraine, Government of Uk ...

s – 60 On 18 July 2020, the number of raions was reduced to four. These are: # Kremenchuk Raion (Кременчуцький район), the center is in the city of

; # Lubny Raion (Лубенський район), the center is in the city of Lubny; # Myrhorod Raion (Миргородський район), the center is in the city of

Myrhorod Myrhorod (, ) is a city in Poltava Oblast, central Ukraine. It serves as the Capital city, administrative center of Myrhorod Raion. Myrhorod also hosts the administration of Myrhorod urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. It is locate ...

; # Poltava Raion (Полтавський район), the center is in the city of

Until 2020

Note: Asterisks (*) Though the administrative center of the raion is housed in the city that it is named after, cities do not answer to the raion authorities only towns do; instead they are directly subordinated to the oblast government and therefore are not counted as part of raion statistics.

Nomenclature

Most of Ukraine's oblasts are named after their

capital Capital and its variations may refer to: Common uses * Capital city, a municipality of primary status ** Capital region, a metropolitan region containing the capital ** List of national capitals * Capital letter, an upper-case letter Econom ...

cities, officially referred to as "oblast centers" (, translit. ''oblasnyi tsentr''). The name of each oblast is a relative

adjective An adjective (abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a word that describes or defines a noun or noun phrase. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun. Traditionally, adjectives are considered one of the main part of speech, parts of ...

, formed by adding a feminine

suffix In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns and adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs. Suffixes can ca ...

to the name of respective center city: ''Poltava'' is the center of the ''Poltavs'ka oblast (Poltava Oblast). Most oblasts are also sometimes referred to in a feminine noun form, following the convention of traditional regional place names, ending with the suffix "-shchyna", as is the case with the Poltava Oblast, ''Poltavshchyna''.

Gallery

File:Украина, Полтава - Корпусный сад 02.jpg, Corpus garden File:Фонтан біля Кредмашу.jpg, Kremenchuk File:Володимирський Майдан.jpg, Lubny File:Myrgorod-resort entrance.JPG, Myrhorod File:У центрі Гадяча.JPG, Hadiach File:Karlivka2.jpg, Karlivka File:Хорол. Успенська церква.JPG, Khorol File:Троїцька церква. Котельва.JPG, Kotelva File:Залізничний вокзал (Кременчук).jpg, Railway station in Kremenchuk File:Пам'ятник Загиблим у Великій Вітчизняній Війні. с. Оболонь. Полтавська область.jpg, Monument to those killed in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

File:Russian Field Artillery - Detail of Diorama of Battle of Poltava - Battle of Poltava History Museum.jpg, Detail of Diorama of

Battle of Poltava The Battle of Poltava took place 8 July 1709, was the decisive and largest battle of the Great Northern War. The Russian army under the command of Tsar Peter I defeated the Swedish army commanded by Carl Gustaf Rehnskiöld. The battle would l ...

File:Deevka.jpg, Deivka

References

External links

*
State Administration of Poltava Region
– official site
Information Card of the Region
– official site of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine {{Authority control Oblasts of Ukraine States and territories established in 1937 1937 establishments in Ukraine