Communes of New Caledonia

Originally, I wrote about the name of Boulouparis commune: "This is a curious case. All modern maps I could find show the spelling with no 's', but a Google search returns more than three times as many references to the spelling with the 's'." At that time I had no explanation; now I have two, which differ in detail. Tim Waters wrote, "it's a symbol of the pro-French stance of the town to change its name to be spelt more like that of Paris." This page  says that the final 's' was added on 1973-03-28 as an homage to Jacques Chirac. It's not clear how a final 's' honors M. Chirac, who at that time was a cabinet member and member of the Chamber of Deputies. He was mayor of Paris from 1977-03-20 until 1995-05-16. This would make a lot more sense if the date of the name change was 1977-03-28 instead of 1973.

New Caledonia is divided into three provinces, which are further divided into 33 communes. However, one commune (Poya) is split between two provinces. Here are the communes of New Caledonia.

CommuneHASCCodePopulationCapital
Bélep NC.NO.BE011,601 Waala
Boulouparis NC.SU.BP023,300 Boulouparis
Bourail NC.SU.BR036,448 Bourail
Canala NC.NO.CA045,869 Canala
Dumbéa NC.SU.DU0532,290 Dumbéa
Farino NC.SU.FA06636 Farino
Hienghène NC.NO.HI073,897 Hienghène
Houaïlou NC.NO.HO086,273 Houaïlou
Kaala-Gomen NC.NO.KG102,530 Kaala-Gomen
Koné NC.NO.KN118,331 Koné
Kouaoua NC.NO.KA331,859 Kouaoua
Koumac NC.NO.KM124,766 Koumac
La Foa NC.SU.LF134,035 La Foa
Lifou NC.IL.LI1422,835 Wé
l'Île des PinsNC.SU.IP092,921 Vao
Maré NC.IL.MA1512,424 Tadine
Moindou NC.SU.MO16869 Moindou
Mont-Dore NC.SU.MD1727,939 Mont-Dore
Nouméa NC.SU.NO18101,909Nouméa
Ouégoa NC.NO.OG193,198 Ouégoa
Ouvéa NC.IL.OV208,302 Fayaoué
Païta NC.SU.PA2121,583 Païta
Poindimié NC.NO.PD226,358 Poindimié
Ponérihouen NC.NO.PH234,153 Ponérihouen
Pouébo NC.NO.PB244,036 Pouébo
Pouembout NC.NO.PT252,872 Pouembout
Poum NC.NO.PM262,069 Poum
Poya NC.NO.PY273,541 Poya
Sarraméa NC.SU.SA28856 Sarraméa
Thio NC.SU.TH293,287 Thio
Touho NC.NO.TO303,112 Touho
Voh NC.NO.VO313,813 Voh
Yaté NC.SU.YA322,683 Yaté
  • HASC: Hierarchical administrative subdivision codes.
    The middle two letters identify the province. For key,
    see "Administrative Subdivisions of Countries".
    Exception: Poya commune lies partly in Nord
    province and partly in Sud. Poya, the city, is in Nord.
  • Code: INSEE code for commune. Prefix 988 to get
    the full code. Ex.: 98830 for Touho. INSEE is the
    French national statistics agency (Institut National
    de la Statistique et des Études Économiques).
  • Population: 2015-01-01 census.

Change history:

  1. INSEE  says that New Caledonia's division into communes is a result of Law No. 69-5 (1969-01-03), Decree No. 69-272 (1969-03-28), and Decree No. 77-20 (1977-01-05). I know from other sources that Poum commune was created in 1977-01, so I assume that its creation was due to Decree No. 77-20.
  2. INSEE also says that Decree No. 89-512 (1989-07-24) reorganized New Caledonia into three administrative subdivisions: Nord, Sud, and Îles Loyauté. Moreover, the present statute has preserved the three provinces of New Caledonia, which were created by Referendary Law No. 88-1028 (1988-11-09). The provinces have the same names and territories as the subdivisions, except that the southern part of Poya commune is in Nord subdivision, but it's in Sud province.
  3. 1973-03-28: Name of Bouloupari commune changed to Boulouparis.
  4. 1977-01-05: Poum commune split from Koumac.
  5. 1995-04-25: Kouaoua commune split from Canala.

Other names of subdivisions:

  1. Boulouparis: Bouloupari (obsolete)
  2. Pouébo: Oubatche (obsolete)

Population history:

Commune1956-12-061963-05-021969-03-101976-04-231983-04-151989-04-041996-04-162004-08-312009-07-272015-01-01
Bélep5295735516246867459239308951,601
Boulouparis4836358469251,1391,4561,5912,0892,4183,300
Bourail2,2122,3122,4333,1493,4104,1224,3644,7794,9996,448
Canala2,8163,0973,5593,8843,8423,9663,3743,5123,3415,869
Dumbéa2844631,3044,1915,53810,05213,88818,60224,10332,290
Farino142172161194253237279459598636
Hienghène1,9402,1091,8461,9321,7292,1222,2082,6272,3993,897
Houaïlou2,2412,8083,4753,8533,9953,6714,3324,5373,9456,273
Kaala-Gomen1,1611,2281,2961,4251,2311,5491,7871,8811,9312,530
Koné2,0372,3402,5572,4792,9192,9194,0884,5005,1998,331
Kouaoua1,5241,5861,3451,859
Koumac2,7592,0591,9072,4811,4052,1942,6473,0033,6904,766
La Foa9341,4071,3331,9932,0942,1552,5022,9033,3234,035
Lifou5,5946,0826,8377,5858,1288,72610,00710,3208,62722,835
l'Île des Pins6749309781,0951,2871,4651,6711,8401,9692,921
Maré3,1043,2403,4104,1564,6105,6466,8967,4015,41712,424
Moindou272392291387378461568602704869
Mont-Dore1,2882,6404,80910,65914,61416,37020,78024,19525,68327,939
Nouméa22,23534,99041,85356,07860,11265,11076,29391,38697,579101,909
Ouégoa1,1991,3631,3231,5141,4681,8812,0342,1142,1323,198
Ouvéa2,1802,0872,0012,7772,7723,5403,9744,3593,3928,302
Païta1,3971,9032,5223,4074,8346,0497,86212,06216,35821,583
Poindimié2,1522,5192,4813,0103,6443,5904,3404,8244,8186,358
Ponérihouen1,8401,8531,9482,0651,9322,3262,6912,7262,3844,153
Pouébo1,2941,3881,4721,7821,5032,2422,3522,3812,4164,036
Pouembout4825775877346928541,1891,4712,0782,872
Poum8161,0381,3201,3901,3882,069
Poya1,0661,0191,2812,9151,9611,8622,5222,6002,6483,541
Sarraméa255307331357483400486610636856
Thio1,7762,2533,1762,8943,0192,3682,6142,7432,6293,287
Touho1,3321,3731,4741,6671,9011,9632,2342,2742,2473,112
Voh1,3281,4751,4241,6561,5861,6861,9422,2402,4083,813
Yaté1,4749251,1131,3651,3871,4081,5541,8431,8812,683
Totals68,48086,519100,579133,233145,368164,173196,836230,789245,580320,595

 

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