NEGROS PROVINCE

LOCATION & BOUNDARIES
Negros Occidental is one of the five provinces that compose Western Visayas or Region VI. Located in the northwestern portion of Negros Island, it can be found near the central part of the Philippine Archipelago. It is bounded on the north by the Visayan Sea and on the south by the Sulu Sea.

It is southeast of Panay Island from which it is separated by the Guimaras Strait and on the east is the Taņon Strait and Negros Oriental (its sister province), which forms part of Region VII because of its proximity to Cebu and Central Visayas.

RELIGIOUS SECTS
Based on the study conducted by the Development Academy of the Philippines, Negros Occidental is predominantly Roman Catholic. Applying the 1980 percentage points and computed in terms of the 1995 census of population, Roman Catholics comprise about 86.95 percent of the total population or an aggregate of 2,116,524 Negrenses. The remaining 13.05 percent or 129,012 are distributed among other religious sects such as Aglipayan, Protestant, Iglesia ni Kristo, Adventist and others.

POLITICAL SUBDIVISIONS
Administratively, the province is composed of ten (10) cities, namely: Bacolod (capital city), Bago, Cadiz, Kabankalan, La Carlota, San Carlos, Silay, Sagay, Talisay*, Victorias* and 22 municipalities, namely: Binalbagan, Calatrava, Candoni, Cauayan, E.B. Magalona, Escalante, Himamaylan, Hinigaran, Hinoba-an, Ilog, Isabela, La Castellana, Manapla, Moises Padilla, Murcia, Pontevedra, Salvador Benedicto, San Enrique, Sipalay, Toboso and Valladolid.

* newly-declared city, as of 1998.

TOTAL LAND AREA
Negros Occidental is a longish stretch of land which is approximately 372 kilometers from its northern tip, San Carlos City, to Hinoba-an at the southern end. Shaped like a man's boot when viewed on the map, it has a total land area of about 7,926.07 square kilometers or 792,607.00 hectares.

The province is composed of ten cities with a total land area of 3,140.38 square kilometers or 314,038 hectares composing 39.62 percent of the total provincial area. Kabankalan City has the biggest land area for the cities with 726.41 square kilometers or 72,641 hectares while La Carlota has the smallest with only 137.29 square kilometers or 13,729 hectares.

The total land area for the 22 municipalities, on the other hand, is 4,785.69 square kilometers or 478,569 hectares which constitute 60.38 percent of the total provincial land area. Among the 22 municipalities, Cauayan in the south has the biggest land area with 519.94 square kilometers or 51,994 hectares and San Enrique has the smallest with only 20.96 square kilometers or 2,096 hectares.

CLIMATE AND TEMPERATURE
Negros Occidental has two pronounced seasons, the wet and the dry. The dry season is from late December to early parts of May for northern Negros and from November to May for southern Negros Occidental. For the northern part of the province, the rainy season starts in June, reaches its peak in September and tapers off towards the early part of December. For southern Negros Occidental, the rainy season begins in June, attains its peak in August and levels off towards the dry season shown. The northern monsoon prevails during the dry season while it is the southwest monsoon that dominates during the rainy season.

LANGUAGES & DIALECTS
The provincial population can be classified into groups of people speaking the same languages/dialects. Census results in 1995 revealed that among the 10 known dialects spoken in the province, two Visayan dialects top the list with Hiligaynon or Ilonggo being noted first.

Based on the 1995 percentage share of population, the Hiligaynon-speaking-residents account for about 78.31 percent or 1,906,211 persons of the entire provincial population primarily because it is considered as the principal dialect of the province. This is largely due to the influence of the early migrants coming from Iloilo and the rest of Panay Island. Cebuano, the other dialect, comes in second with 511,422 Negrenses representing 21.01 percent of the total population.

Most residents of the northern and eastern towns of Calatrava, Toboso, Escalante, Sagay and the City of San Carlos speak Cebuano. The proximity of these municipalities to the City of Cebu and Negros Oriental has greatly influenced the spoken dialect of the people. Tagalog-speaking residents, on the other hand, constitute a small 0.18 percent or an aggregate of 4,382 for the entire province and the remaining 0.5 percent or 12,171 speak one of the several dialects spoken all throughout the country as shown in table below.

POPULATION
The present population of Negros Occidental has grown tremendously since the first recorded population count in March, 1903, with a total of 308,272 Negrenses. Since then, several censuses were conducted by the then National Census and Statistics Office (now National Statistics Office) by virtue of Batas Pambansa Blg. 72 authorizing the said office to conduct population censuses every ten years beginning in 1980 followed by the population count in 1990.

The most recent census on population, however, was conducted last May,1995, five years after the 1990 census, showing a population count of 2,434,186 as shown in table below. Compared with the 1990 figures at 2,256,908 there is an increase of 177,228 or 7.8 percent in Negros Occidental population.

LEARN MORE ABOUT MY HOMETOWN
Brief History
Important Festivals
Historical & Cultural Attractions
Negros Province
Tourist Attraction

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