Bydgoszcz Województwo

an administrative unit (province) in Poland located in the basin of the Vistula and Warta rivers. Area, 20, 900 sq km. Population, 1, 898, 000 (1968), 50.4 percent in urban areas. Administrative center, Bydgoszcz.

Most of Bydgoszcz Województwo is situated within the Wielkopolsko-Kujawska Lowland, but its northwestern regions extend to the higher plain of the Pomeranian Lake District, which has a maximum elevation of 202 m. There are widespread glacial and water-glacial deposits and topographical forms and numerous lakes, including Goplo and Charzykowy, in the province. The Vistula, Drweca, Brda, and Noteć rivers flow through Bydgoszcz Województwo. The climate ranges from maritime to continental. The average temperature in January is approximately -2° C, and in July, approximately 17° C. Precipitation is approximately 600 mm annually. There are broad-leaved forests (oak and hornbeam) and coniferous forests (pine and spruce).

Bydgoszcz Województwo was formerly an agrarian region with intensive capitalist agriculture. Since the formation of the Polish People’s Republic socialist industry, two-thirds of which is concentrated in cities along the Vistula, has occupied first place in the economy of Bydgoszcz Województwo (190, 000 employees in 1967). Industrial development has been facilitated by a dense network of railroads—including lines that pass through the province from the Upper Silesian Coal Basin and the central districts to the ports of Gdansk and Gdynia—and partly by navigation along the Vistula River and the Bydgoszcz Canal. The food-processing, woodworking, and building materials industries developed in Bydgoszcz Województwo long ago, but the machine-building and chemical industries (production of synthetic materials, soda, and nitrogen fertilizers) were established in the postwar years.

Agricultural lands occupy 66 percent of the area of Bydgoszcz Województwo; of this, 56 percent is arable and 23 percent forest. On most of the light podzolic soils the predominant crops are rye (approximately 28 percent of the arable land) and potatoes (17 percent). On the fertile soddy gley soils in the south (Kujawy) and northeast, sugar beets, barley, and wheat are widespread. Pig raising has developed (1, 216, 000 head in 1968), as well as dairy animal husbandry (768, 000 head of cattle, including 378, 000 cows).