Province vs. Region

Main Difference

The main difference between Province and Region is that the Province is a territorial entity within a country or state and Region is a 2D or 3D defined space, mainly in terrestrial and astrophysics sciences.

• Province

  A province is almost always an administrative division, within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman provincia, which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire’s territorial possessions outside Italy. The term province has since been adopted by many countries, and in those with no actual provinces, it has come to mean “outside the capital city”. While some provinces were produced artificially by colonial powers, others were formed around local groups with their own ethnic identities. Many have their own powers independent of federal authority, especially in Canada. In other countries, like China, provinces are the creation of central government, with very little autonomy.

• Region

  In geography, regions are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and the environment (environmental geography). Geographic regions and sub-regions are mostly described by their imprecisely defined, and sometimes transitory boundaries, except in human geography, where jurisdiction areas such as national borders are defined in law.

  Apart from the global continental regions, there are also hydrospheric and atmospheric regions that cover the oceans, and discrete climates above the land and water masses of the planet. The land and water global regions are divided into subregions geographically bounded by large geological features that influence large-scale ecologies, such as plains and features.

  As a way of describing spatial areas, the concept of regions is important and widely used among the many branches of geography, each of which can describe areas in regional terms. For example, ecoregion is a term used in environmental geography, cultural region in cultural geography, bioregion in biogeography, and so on. The field of geography that studies regions themselves is called regional geography.

  In the fields of physical geography, ecology, biogeography, zoogeography, and environmental geography, regions tend to be based on natural features such as ecosystems or biotopes, biomes, drainage basins, natural regions, mountain ranges, soil types. Where human geography is concerned, the regions and subregions are described by the discipline of ethnography.

  A region has its own nature that could not be moved. The first nature is its natural environment (landform, climate, etc.). The second nature is its physical elements complex that were built by people in the past. The third nature is its socio-cultural context that could not be replaced by new immigrants.

• Province (noun)

  a principal administrative division of a country or empire

  “Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province”

• Province (noun)

  Northern Ireland

  “all-party talks on the future of the Province”

• Province (noun)

  a district under an archbishop or a metropolitan.

• Province (noun)

  a territory outside Italy under a Roman governor.

• Province (noun)

  the whole of a country outside the capital, especially when regarded as lacking in sophistication or culture

  “I made my way home to the dreary provinces by train”

• Province (noun)

  an area of special knowledge, interest, or responsibility

  “she knew little about wine—that had been her father’s province”