Pays de la Loire (French pronunciation:[pe.id(ə)lalwaʁ]; lit.'Lands of the Loire') is one of the eighteen regions of France, located on the country's Atlantic coast. It was created in the 1950s to serve as a zone of influence for its capital and most populated city, Nantes, one of a handful of French "balancing metropolises" (métropoles d'équilibre).[a] In 2020, Pays de la Loire had a population of 3,832,120.
Geography
The region Pays de la Loire and its departments on the background of historical provincesA vine in Brem, Pays de la Loire
Anjou: is largely absorbed into the Maine-et-Loire department; the rest in the immediately adjoining departments (the whole of the historical province Anjou is contained inside Pays de la Loire).
Maine: is now divided between the Mayenne and Sarthe departments; the whole of the former province of Maine is contained inside Pays de la Loire.
Part of Poitou: is contained within the Vendée department; most of the old province of Poitou is inside the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region to the south.
Small part of Touraine: southeast of Maine-et-Loire department; the rest, most of the former province of Touraine is inside the Centre region.
Thus the name of the region, chosen by the French central government, was not based on history, but a postwar creation of purely geographical reference: Pays ("lands") de la Loire ("of the Loire").
A steep increase in the population was seen particularly as people migrated from all over France to the Loire region due to the rise of Nantes to prominence.
Economy
The gross domestic product (GDP) of the region was €119.1 billion in 2018, accounting for 5.1% of French economic output. GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power was €28,200 or 94% of the EU27 average in the same year. The GDP per employee was 102% of the EU average.[6]
The biggest city in Pays de la Loire is Nantes, which is the sixth most populated city in France with over 319,000 people (city proper) and a metropolitan population of almost 1,000,000.
Angers is another metropolis of the region. It has a metropolitan population of about 400,000 and is the third biggest job provider in north-western France, just behind Nantes and Rennes. Saint-Nazaire is a major harbour town downstream from Nantes on the mouth of the Loire river.
Le Mans is another city in Pays de la Loire. Situated in north-east Pays de la Loire, Le Mans area is home to over 300,000 (metropolitan population).
^In the 1960s under the presidency of Charles de Gaulle, eight large regional cities of France (Lille, Nancy, Strasbourg, Lyon, Nantes, Bordeaux, Marseille, Toulouse) were made "balancing metropolises", receiving special financial and technical help from the national government in order to counterbalance the excessive weight of Paris inside France.
^Tockner, Klement; Uehlinger, Urs; Robinson, Christopher T. (2009). Rivers of Europe. Academic Press. p. 183. ISBN978-0-12-369449-2. Retrieved 11 April 2011.
.svg){kind=small}
