Departments of Benin

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Updates: 

FIPS Publication Change Notice No. 9, affecting FIPS PUB 10-4, was issued on 2004-10-01. It assigns FIPS codes to the twelve departments, supplanting the codes for the former six provinces. They are shown in the table below.

The department of Plateau was misspelled Plateaux in my original source. I've fixed the spelling below. Also, I had listed Cotonou as the capital of Atlantique department, which was correct before the creation of the new departments. Cotonou has now become the capital of Littoral department, because that's where it is now located. As far as I can tell, the capitals of the other departments haven't been designated yet. Jose Gavinha has sent me some tentative names of capitals, which I have provided faute de mieux.

ISO 3166-2 Newsletter Number I-2 was published on 2002-05-21. It adds the six new departments.

Six new departments were created in Benin, effective 1999-01-15. The French Embassy published a chronology which includes these dates:
1993-01: The Estates General of the territorial administration announce a plan to increase the number of departments by dividing each of the existing ones in two (12 in place of 6).
1998-07-24: Final adoption of the five decentralization laws. The choice of the future departmental capitals will be left to the government.

Since the publication of "Administrative Subdivisions of Countries", I have found more recent census data for Benin. They are shown below.

Country overview: 

Benin began the 20th century under the name of Dahomey, as a French colony. On 1960-08-01, it became an independent member of the French Community. It has retained its borders virtually unchanged throughout the 20th century, bearing in mind that its northern (inland) borders were ill-defined in the early years.

Other names of country: 

1. Danish: Benin
2. Dutch: Benin, Republiek Benin (formal)
3. English: Republic of Benin (formal), Dahomey (obsolete)
4. Finnish: Benin
5. French: Bénin m, République f du Bénin (formal)
6. German: Benin n
7. Icelandic: Benín
8. Italian: Benin m
9. Norwegian: Benin, Republikken Benin (formal)
10. Portuguese: Benim n (m in Brazil), República f do Benim m (formal), Daomé (obsolete)
11. Spanish: Benin, Benín, República f Popular de Benin (formal)
12. Swedish: Benin

Origin of name: 

Named for Bini, an ancient kingdom on the Gulf of Guinea

Primary subdivisions: 

Benin is divided into twelve départements (departments).

Further subdivisions:

See the Communes of Benin page.

Benin now consists of twelve départements (departments), subdivided into 77 communes, which in turn are divided into arrondissements and finally into villages or city districts. Before the reorganization of 1999, it had six provinces, further divided into 84 districts, which were categorized as urban or rural. Before independence, the six provinces were subdivided into 29 préfectures.

Origins of names: 

1. Atacora: from Atacora mountain range
2. Atlantique: from Atlantic Ocean
3. Collines: French for hills
4. Littoral: French for coast

Change history: 

1. 1904: French colony of Dahomey incorporated into French West Africa as a territory.
2. 1920: In the aftermath of World War I, the former German colony of Togo was split from north to south. The western third was mandated to Great Britain, and the eastern two-thirds to France. For part of the period between the wars, Dahomey and the French mandate of Togo were combined under the name Dahomey for administrative purposes.
3. ~1923: Capital moved from Abomey to Porto-Novo.
4. 1975-11-30: Country name changed from Dahomey to People's Republic of Benin. These were the departments of Benin at that time.

1. 1999-01-15: Alibori department split from Borgou; Collines department split from Zou; Couffo department split from Mono; Donga department split from Atacora; Littoral department split from Atlantique; Plateau department split from Ouémé.

Other names of subdivisions: 

1. Alibori: Département de l'Alibori (formal)
2. Atacora: Atakora (variant); Département de l'Atacora (formal); Nord-Ouest (obsolete)
3. Atlantique: Département de l'Atlantique (formal); Sud (obsolete)
4. Borgou: Département du Borgou (formal); Nord-Est (obsolete)
5. Collines: Département des Collines (formal)
6. Couffo: Département du Couffo (formal); Kouffo (variant)
7. Donga: Département de la Donga (formal)
8. Littoral: Département du Littoral (formal)
9. Mono: Département du Mono (formal); Sud-Ouest (obsolete)
10. Ouémé: Département de l'Ouémé (formal); Sud-Est (obsolete)
11. Plateau: Département du Plateau (formal)
12. Zou: Centre (obsolete); Département du Zou (formal)