France's Island

La Isle of France (in French): Île-de-France, pronounced/il(øn) dørn ^f)›(sp)/( listen)), also popularly known as Parisian region (in French): Région parisienne, pronounced/)e circlej) contrast pa)izj distractn(ambi)/), is one of the 18 regions that, together with the territories of Ultramar, make up the French Republic. It is located around its capital, Paris. It is the richest region in Europe with a GDP of more than 1 billion dollars.

It is located in the northwest of the country, bordered on the north by Haute-France, on the east by Grand Est, on the southeast by Burgundy-Franche-Comté, on the south by Centre-Loire Valley and on the west by Normandy. With 12,011 km² it is the second smallest region —before Corsica—, and with 12,140,526 inhabitants in January 2019 and 987 inhab/km² is the most populous and most densely populated, respectively. It is also the third most populous subnational entity in the European Union after North Rhine-Westphalia and Bavaria. It is one of the regions with the highest per capita income in the world. The territorial reform of 2014 did not affect the delimitation of the region, being one of the six metropolitan regions that did not change.

History

The Île-de-France finds its origins in the royal estate formed from the X century by the Capetian dynasty. Its limits have changed since the end of the Old Regime. This province extended further to the north and north-east including the present departments of Oise and Aisne, and was less vast in an easterly direction as it did not include the Brie region. Its limits are preserved practically intact to the south and west. It formed the zone of economic interest of the commercial corporations of Paris, which contributed to fixing its borders.

With the creation, during the French Revolution, of the French departments in 1790, it was divided into three departments: Seine (Seine), Seine and Oise (Seine- et-Oise) and Seine-et-Marne (Seine-et-Marne).

In 1959, with the aim of decentralizing the Parisian core, the government created the "District of the Paris Region" (District de la Région de Paris), chaired by a general delegate, Paul Delouvrier who, starting in 1964, undertook an important task of administrative decentralization. In 1965, he increased the number of Parisian departments from three to eight. That of Seine-et-Marne, which occupies almost half of the regional area, remained intact. Paris became a department surrounded by the new departments arranged in two concentric belts: the so-called petite couronne (little crown) made up of the Hauts de Seine i> (Hauts-de-Seine), the Seine-Saint-Denis (Seine-Saint-Denis) and the Val-de-Marne (Val-de-Marne), and the grande couronne (great crown) that make up the Val-d'Oise (Val-d'Oise), Yvelines, Essonne and Seine-et-Marne.

That same year, Paul Delouvrier's team launched an ambitious development and urban planning plan that profoundly changed the configuration of the region. Extensive urbanization programs were carried out in cities of the Petite couronne such as Nanterre, Bobigny and Créteil, and new cities were created in the Grande couronne such as Évry, Marne-la-Vallée, Cergy-Pontoise or Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines. The Réseau Express Régional (RER) began to be implemented, an extensive commuter train network connected to the Paris suburban metro network.

In the framework of the political decentralization and the creation of the new French regions that were operated from 1972 and culminated in 1982, the «Arrondissement of the Paris region» became the «Ile-de-region -France» in 1976.

Geography

The geography of Île-de-France is physically marked by its location in the center of a sedimentary basin, the Paris Basin, with a relatively flat relief, irrigated by a navigable river, the Seine, whose main tributaries They converge precisely in this region, due to a temperate climate and very fertile agricultural soils, and in the economic aspect, due to the presence in its center of Paris, the capital and main urban agglomeration of France. With an area of 12,072 km², Île-de-France is one of the smallest French regions (the smallest in metropolitan France after Corsica), but by far the largest in terms of population (11 million inhabitants, approximately one 18% of the French population) and by its GDP (approximately 30% of France's GDP). It concentrates the economic, administrative and political powers of a highly centralized country, and is at the center of a communication network that branches out into a star centered in Paris.

Relief

The highest point reaches 216.5 m, in Neuilly-en-Vexin (Val-d'Oise), and the lowest, 11 m, in Port-Villez (Yvelines). The average altitude is 33 m.

Climate

Map of the region Isle of France.

The Île-de-France region benefits from a temperate oceanic climate (Cfb), moderated by oceanic influences. The average temperature is around 11 °C and the average rainfall is 600 mm. Throughout the region there is a semi-oceanic climate.

Land uses

Despite its strong urbanization, Île-de-France is mostly rural: of its 12,070 km², 45% is dedicated to agriculture (one of the most productive in France) and 23% is forest. Among the most important forests in the region, we can mention those of Fontainebleau, Montmorency, Saint-Germain-en-Laye and Sénart. However, the progression of urbanization continues, year after year, gaining ground on the agricultural area, which has lost 1,000 km² in the last fifty years due to urban development and infrastructure development.

Economy

The economy of Île-de-France is characterized by its preponderant place in the national economy and by the importance of the tertiary sector. It represents 30% of the country's GDP (2012), with more than 80% corresponding to the services sector. Although the region has undergone a strong deindustrialization, it remains the first French industrial region. Agriculture, which, as we have already said, occupies 45% of the regional territory, of which two thirds are dedicated to cereals, is one of the most productive in France. Île-de-France is also a top-level tourist destination.

The poverty rate in Île-de-France was 15.9% in 2015, up from 12.3% in 2006. The region is also increasingly unequal. Housing prices have pushed the most modest out of Paris.

Paris produced €738 billion (or US$882 billion at market exchange rates) or about 1/3 of France's economy in 2018, while the economy of the Paris metropolitan area, the largest of Europe with London, generates about 1/3 of France's economy, or about $1.0 trillion.

The regional economy has gradually shifted towards high value-added service industries (finance, IT services, etc.) and high-tech manufacturing (electronics, optics, aerospace, etc.). In 2014, the industry represented just under five percent of the companies in the region and 10.2 percent of salaried workers. Commerce and services concentrate 84 percent of the commercial establishments in the region and have 83.3 percent of the wage earners.

Financial services and insurance are important sectors of the regional economy; major French banks and insurance companies, including BNP Paribas, Société Générale, and Crédit Agricole, are based in the region. The region is also home to the headquarters of major French utility and telecommunications companies, including Orange S.A., Veolia and EDF. The French stock exchange, the Bourse de Paris, now known as Euronext Paris, occupies a historic building in the center of Paris and ranks fourth among the world's stock exchanges, after New York, Tokyo and London.

Other important sectors of the regional economy include energy companies (Orano, Engie, Électricité de France and Total S.A.). The two main French carmakers, Renault in Flins-sur-Seine and Groupe PSA in Poissy, do much of their assembly work outside of France, but still have research centers and large plants in the region. Major French and European defense and aerospace companies, including Airbus, Thales Group, Dassault Aviation, Safran Aircraft Engines, the European Space Agency, Alcatel-Lucent and Arianespace, have a large presence in the region.

The energy sector is also well established in the region. The nuclear power industry, with its major company Orano, is based in Île-de-France, as is the leading French oil company Total SA, the leading French company in the Fortune Global 500, and the leading electricity company, Électricité de French. The energy company Engie also has its headquarters in the region in La Défense.

Culture

Architecture

Ile-de-France is the cradle of Gothic architecture whose most outstanding works are the Notre Dame de Paris Cathedral, the Saint-Denis Basilica and the Sainte Chapelle.

Sports

Paris Saint-Germain is a soccer club founded in 1970. It has played in the first professional division since 1974, and became one of the most successful in the country. The region's other professional soccer team is US Créteil-Lusitanos, who played in the second division for the first time in 1988.

The region also has two professional rugby teams (Stade Français Paris and Racing Métro 92), two basketball teams (Paris-Levallois and JSF Nanterre) and three handball teams (Paris Saint-Germain, Ivry and Tremblay).

The Roland Garros Tournament is one of four Grand Slam tennis events. The Paris Masters is an ATP Masters 1000 tournament that also attracts the world's top players.

Map and demographics

Departments of the Isle of France (Official INSEE 1999 census)

	Departments	Population	Area	Density	Population growth 1990-1999
	Paris City (75)	2.142,800	105 km2	20.330/km2	-1.26%
Little Crown (Petite Couronne)	Altos-del-Sena (92)	1.428.881	176 km2	8.119/km2	+2.67%
	Sena-San Denís (93)	1.382.861	236 km2	5.860/km2	+0.12%
	Marne Valley (94)	1.227.250	245 km2	5.009/km2	+0.96%
Grand Crown (Grande Couronne)	Oise Valley (95)	1.105.464	1.246 km2	887/km2	+5.32%
	Essonne (91)	1.134.238	1.804 km2	629/km2	+4,56%
	Yvelines (78)	1.354.304	2.284 km2	593/km2	+3.61%
	Seine-et-Marne (77)	1.193.767	5,915 km2	202/km2	+10.72%

Immigration

In a 2010 census, 23.0% of the total population in the Île-de-France region was born outside of metropolitan France, up from 19.7% in a 1999 census.