Another state in Germany would be North Rhine-Westphalia or usually known as NRW and the official shorter term would be NW. this is located in the westernmost part of the country and is popular to be the most populous and most powerful in economic terms of all sixteen states. With the population of over eighteen million inhabitants the state has it has helped add to the country’s gross domestic product.
The state shares a border with Belgium in the southwest part, Netherlands in the west and northwest regions and with other German states such as Lower Saxony in the north and northeast, Rhineland-Palatinate in the south and Hesse in the southeast.
North Rhine-Westphalia has the capital city of Düsseldorf, the state’s largest city is Cologne and other major cities include, Oberhausen, Aachen, Bielefeld, Bonn, Bochum, Bottrop, Bergisch Gladbach, Mönchengladbach, Mülheim, Münster, Gelsenkirchen, Krefeld, Hagen, Hamm, Herne, Iserlohn, Leverkusen, Neuss, Paderborn, Recklinghausen, Remscheid, Siegen, Solingen, Witten, and Wuppertal.
Geography
The state of North Rhine-Westphalia is in the center of the largest metropolitan area of Germany which is the urbanized region of Rhine-Ruhr. This Rhine-Ruhr is composed of cities like Düsseldorf, Bonn and Cologne and the Ruhr Area which is composed of the other cities of Dortmund, Essen, Duisburg, Bochum, Gelsenkirchen and Oberhausen.
The state has an area of approximately covering the distance from north to south of 291 kilometers, and from east to west of 266 kilometers. The total length of the state border is around 1,645 kilometers including other countries and states of Belgium, Netherlands, Lower Saxony, Hesse and Rhineland Palatinate.
The state has always been connected as an industrial and urban group. A large part of the state approximately 52% of which is more on agriculture and forest areas are covering around 25% of the area. The most known rivers that are flowing all through North Rhine-Westphalia, is the Rhine, Ruhr, Ems, Lippe and the Weser. The shortest river, which flows within the city of Paderborn, is called the Pader.
History
In august 23, 1946 the state of North Rhine-Westphalia was established by the British military administration. Originally, it consists of Westphalia and the northern areas of Rhine Province which were part of Prussia. It was in 1947 wherein the former state of Lippe was merged with North Rhine-Westphalia thus having the present borders that the state has.
From the year 1966 to 2005, the state was governed by the SPD or the Social Democratic Party of Germany or SPD led governments. In the 2005 state elections, the victory was given to the CDU or the Christian Democratic Union of Germany. Jürgen Rüttgers, their top candidate united and formed a coalition government with the Free Democratic Party or FDP. In the 2010 elections, majority of this government lost in parliament and until now, investigatory steps have been done amongst the parties involved, till now it remains uncertain as to which coalition will rein its constitution in the state government.
Economy
In the year 1950 – 1960’s Westphalia was known to be the land for coal and steel or otherwise known as Land von Kohle und Stahl. After the recovery period from the World War II, the Ruhr became the most important industrial region in all of Europe. In the late 1960’s recurrent crisis was the reason to the diminish of the industrial branches, although in other branches that were more inclined in productions such as mechanical, engineering, metal and iron industry were increasing and has more growth in comparison.
Even with the economic changes with regards to the structuring and growth, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as of 2007 was 21.8% of the total German GDP making the state of North Rhine-Westphalia one of the important economical areas not only in Germany but all over the world.
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