The Philippines is officially called Republic of the Philippines. In Filipino, it’s Republika ng Pilipinas. The country is an archipelago with 7,107 islands and has three main geographical divisions namely: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. Its capital is Manila, which is a part of Metro Manila.

In 2012, the population is estimated at 96.7 million. According to the Commission on Overseas Filipinos, there are approximately 9.5 million Filipinos working or residing abroad as of 2010. This makes it the country in the world with the largest diasporas.   

From the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), many work or reside abroad. In Europe, they are in Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

Administration

For administrative purposes, the Philippines is divided into: 

• Regular administrative regions,
• Provinces,
• Municipalities and 
• Barangays (or Barrios).

Regions have provinces and cities, and the latter could be highly urbanized or independent component. These cities are autonomous of the province.  

Provinces also have cities, which are called component cities. They are under the jurisdiction of the province.

As of March 2010, the Philippines has 17 regions, 81 provinces, 144 cities, 1,491 municipalities, and 42,028 barangays.

The regions are numbered and there are 13 numbered regions (with Regions IV having an A and B), which makes 14. The unnumbered regions are Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARRM), Cordillera Administrative Region and National Capital Region (NCR).

 

Cordillera Administrative Region

There are six provinces in the CAR namely: Abra, Apayao, Benguet, Ifugao, Kalinga and Mountain Province.

For its cities, Baguio City is a highly urbanized city located in Benguet and Tabuk City is a component city of Kalinga.  

Baguio City, also called the “Summer Capital of the Philippines” is the seat of the CAR.yb

 

References

Administrative divisions of the Philippines, Wikipedia, last modified on February 17, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_divisions_of_the_Philippines

Baguio, Wikipedia, last modified on February 19, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baguio_City,_Philippines.

“General Information: A Brief History of Baguio City,” Go Baguio! accessed February 19, 2014, http://www.gobaguio.com/history-of-baguio-city.html#.UwSEOM6glR0.

List of cities in the Philippines, Wikipedia, last modified on January 20, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_the_Philippines.

Overseas Filipino, Wikipedia, last modified on  February 12, 2014,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_Filipino.

Philippines, Wikipedia, last modified on February 16, 2014, 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippines. 

Philippines-Population, accessed February 19, 2014, http://countryeconomy.com/demography/population/philippines.

 

Tabuk, Philippines, Wikipedia, last modified on January 21, 2014,  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabuk_City,_Kalinga.

 

Acknowledgment:

I would like to thank Ric Cuyob and Gil Tiban Catimo for their contribution to the list of countries in Europe (see paragraph 3.) Ric added Denmark, Greece and Poland; Gil added Cyprus, Portugal and Turkey.