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TheCounties of Denmark (Danish:Danmarks amter) were former subdivisions of metropolitanDenmark and overseas territories, used primarily for administrative regions, with each county having its own council with substantial powers. Originally there had been twenty-four counties, but the number was reduced to roughly fourteen in 1970 – the number fluctuated slightly over the next three decades. In 2006 there were thirteen traditional counties as well as three municipalities with county status (the island ofBornholm, which was a county from 1660 until 2002, became aregional municipality with county powers, but only briefly from 2003 until 2006). On 1 January 2007, as a result of thestrukturreformen, the counties were abolished and replaced by five largerregions which, unlike the counties, are not municipalities.[1]
Copenhagen County comprised all the municipalities ofMetropolitan Copenhagen, exceptCopenhagen Municipality andFrederiksberg Municipality which, on account of their peculiarity of being outside any of the traditional counties, had the equivalent of "county status". On 1 January 2007 these two municipalities lost their special status.
Greenland and theFaroe Islands are also part of theDanish Realm, but both enjoy internal autonomy. Both are largely self-governing, and each community sends two members to the DanishParliament. The Faroe Islands obtained self-government in 1948; from 1816 to 1948 the islands had the status of a Danish county. Greenland changed from a colony to an overseascounty in 1953, and subsequently gained home rule in 1979.[citation needed]
Agovernment proposal in 2004 called for the counties to be abolished and replaced by five largeregions withhealth care as their main responsibilities: two regions inJutland, two regions inZealand and one region coveringFunen and the southernmost part of Jutland. The proposal also required the municipalities to merge reducing them from 271 to 98, with a minimum of 20,000 inhabitants in each municipality, although some exceptions were made to this rule. In 2007, 25 municipalities had fewer than 30,000 inhabitants each, with the average number of inhabitants over 55,500 per municipality. Only theUnited Kingdom andIreland had more populous entities at the lowest political administrative level.
The reform was confirmed by theDanish Parliament on 24 February 2005 and the counties were abolished on 1 January 2007.
The counties and county-level municipalities are listed below.
Map no. | Name | Capital | Type of entity | Population (2006) | Total area (km2) | Pop. density (per km2) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Greenland County (from 1953 to 1979) | Nuuk | County | n/a | 2,166,000 (excluded from total) | n/a |
| 1 | Copenhagen Municipality | (Part of)Copenhagen | Municipality with county tasks | 501,158 | 91.3 | 5,489.1 |
| 2 | Frederiksberg Municipality | Frederiksberg | Municipality with county tasks | 91,855 | 8.7 | 10,560.5 |
| 3 | Copenhagen County | Glostrup | County | 618,529 | 526 | 1,175.9 |
| 4 | Frederiksborg County | Hillerød | County | 378,686 | 1,347 | 281.1 |
| 5 | Roskilde County | Roskilde | County | 241,523 | 891 | 271 |
| 6 | West Zealand County | Sorø | County | 307,207 | 2,984 | 103 |
| 7 | Storstrøm County | Nykøbing | County | 262,781 | 3,398 | 77.3 |
| 8 | Funen County | Odense | County | 478,347 | 3,485 | 137.2 |
| 9 | South Jutland County | Aabenraa | County | 252,433 | 3,939 | 64.1 |
| 10 | Ribe County | Ribe | County | 224,261 | 3,132 | 71.6 |
| 11 | Vejle County | Vejle | County | 360,921 | 2,997 | 120.4 |
| 12 | Ringkjøbing County | Ringkøbing | County | 275,065 | 4,854 | 56.7 |
| 13 | Viborg County | Viborg | County | 234,896 | 4,122 | 57 |
| 14 | North Jutland County | Aalborg | County | 495,090 | 6,173 | 80.2 |
| 15 | Aarhus County | Århus | County | 661,370 | 4,561 | 145 |
| 16 | Bornholm | Rønne | county (1970–2002), regional municipality with county tasks (2003–2006) | 43,347 | 588 | 73.7 |
| Denmark | Copenhagen | Entire country | 5,427,459 | 43,093 | 125.9 | |
Ringkjøbing County used an old spelling of its name, while its capital city and state authorities used the modern Danish spelling,Ringkøbing.
The archipelagoErtholmene, located northeast ofBornholm, have never been a part of a municipality, county, or (from 2007) region. Statistics Denmark calls themChristiansø andFrederiksø, named after the two inhabited islets. They are included in numbers for Denmark (92 inhabitants; 0.39 square kilometers). The land area of Denmark is 42,394 square kilometers.
