Kherson oblast

Kherson oblast [Херсонська область; Khersonska oblast]. An administrative region in southern Ukraine, bordering on Mykolaiv oblast to the west, Dnipropetrovsk oblast to the north, Zaporizhia oblast to the east, and the Autonomous Republic of Crimea to the south, with the Black Sea coast in the southwest, the Syvash Inlet in the south and the Sea of Azov in the southeast. Formed on 30 March 1944 with Kherson as its capital, it covers an area of 28,461 sq km (4.7 percent of the territory of Ukraine). With an estimated population of 1,001,600 in 2022, it had the lowest population density (35.2 persons per sq km) of all the oblasts in Ukraine. Until 2020 it was divided among 18 raions, 237 rural councils, 9 cities, and 30 towns (smt); with administrative decentralization of Ukraine in 2020, the smaller divisions were consolidated into 5 raions and 49 rural councils. The 5 raions are (area in sq km and 2021 population estimate in thousands): Beryslav (4,747 sq km, 96.0), Henichesk (or Henicheske, 7,120.5 sq km, 119.9), Kakhovka (or Kakhivka 6,395.8 sq km, 219.8), Kherson (3,841.9 sq km, 456.5), and Skadovsk (or Skadovske, 5,255 sq km 124.5).

Full-scale invasion by Russian armed forces on 24 February 2022 from the Russian-occupied Crimea resulted in the occupation of Kherson oblast. Ukrainian counteroffensive, however, liberated the right bank of the Dnipro River and on 11 November 2022 the Armed Forces of Ukraine entered the city of Kherson. Upon their retreat, the Russian forces pilloried the museums of Kherson, bridges were destroyed and later the Kakhovka dam was breached (6 June 2023), causing the drainage of the Kakhovka Reservoir, downriver loss of lives and damage to infrastructure, water supply, and the environment. Even so, the left bank of the Dnipro, with about two-thirds of the area of Kherson oblast (as of 2025), remain occupied by the Russian army.

Physical geography. The oblast is located in the steppe of the Black Sea Lowland on both banks of the Dnipro River directly north of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. The land is flat, gently sloping towards the sea; its right bank is slightly elevated, prone to gully erosion and dissected by ravines; its left bank beyond the floodplain to the southeast has sandy terraces with dunes and the plain beyond has small depressions. Its coastline is dotted with shallow saltwater lakes, limans, bays, spits, and sandy islands. In its northern part the soils are mostly low-humus chernozems; in the south they are mostly of the dark-chestnut alkaline variety. Kherson oblast is the least forested (4.8 percent of its land area) of all the oblasts of Ukraine. Virgin steppe flora and fauna are preserved at the Askaniia-Nova Biosphere Reserve (est 1898, officially 1921), the coastal features and its wildlife in the Black Sea Biosphere Reserve (est 1927), the sand dunes and their microhabitats in the Oleshky Sands National Nature Park (est 2010), the Dnipro River floodplain ecosystem in the Lower Dnipro National Nature Park (est 2015); specific features are preserved at five other conservation sites. Limestone, marl, kaolin, and sand deposits abound. Salt and curative muds are extracted from Syvash Lake and the coastal lakes. The principal rivers in the oblast are the Dnipro River and its tributary the Inhulets River; within the oblast, the Dnipro from its Kakhovka Reservoir supplied the Kakhovka and the Krasnoznamianka Irrigation Systems until June 2023; the Inhulets still supplies the Inhulets Irrigation System. The Kakhovka Reservoir also supplied water to the North Crimea Canal and its irrigation systems until 2014 when the Russian Federation occupied the Crimea.

The climate is temperate-continental, with average temperatures (moderated by the sea in the south) in January ranging (N to S) from -4°C to -2^oC and in July to average 22.5°C (both N and S). The average annual precipitation is 300 mm in the south, rising to 420 mm in the north. Winters are mild, with little snowfall (40 to 30 days of snow cover or less); summers are hot and dry, with dust storms and droughts.

History. Human settlement in the area dates back to the late Paleolithic Period. During the Neolithic Period, hunters and gatherers transitioned to farming and livestock-raising and pottery-making. In the Bronze Age it was the domain of the Yamna archeological culture complex (ca 3300–2500 BC) and later the Catacomb culture (2500–1950 BC). In the Iron Age the oblast’s territory was populated by Cimmerians (900–650 BC), Scythians (650–250 BC) and Sarmatians (250 BC to 230 AD) and visited by Pontic Greeks from their nearby city state of Olbia. Invaded by Goths (230) and transited from the east by the Huns (375) and Avars (560), it was occupied by Oguz Kutriguri (560–675), nominally ruled by the Khazar Khanate (675–880), inhabited by Pechenegs (940–1030) and displaced by the Cumans (or Polovtsians, 1035–1230), but contested for control by Kyivan Rus’ with its out port, Oleshia (across the Dnipro River from present-day Kherson). Then the territory fell to the Mongol-led Golden Horde (1240–1440, who granted Oleshia to the Genoese who renamed it Illiche), followed by penetration from the north (1392–1430) by a Rus’ appanage principality within the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

In the 15th century, with the break-up of the Golden Horde, this territory came under the rule of the Crimean Khanate. Gathering at the Tavan crossing of the Dnipro River (with the fortifications Islam-Kermen [est 1492] and Kazi-Kermen [date unknown], near the present-day Kakhovka and Beryslav, respectively), the Nogay Tatars of the Crimean Khanate conducted raids into what is now central-western Ukraine (after 1569 part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) capturing people for slave trade in the Ottoman Empire. They were countered by the Zaporozhian Cossacks who established forts (1570–1638) along the Dnipro River at the northern limit of present-day Kherson oblast and from there launched maritime campaigns (1605–21) to rescue captives from the Turkish dungeons. By 1648–57, of the present-day Kherson oblast, the northern half of its right bank was part of the Zaporozhian Cossack domain, the southern half part of the Özü (Ochakiv) province of the Ottoman Empire, and the left bank part of the Crimean Khanate.

To the north, Muscovite subordination of the Cossack Hetman state (1663) and the Zaporizhia (1686) as its protectorates was followed by the annexation of the Hetman state (1709) by the Russian Empire. After the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–74, the right bank of the present-day Kherson oblast was colonized by Zaporozhian Cossacks (1774–5) while the Zaporozhian lands were annexed by the Russian Empire and colonized (see Southern Ukraine) as part of New Russia gubernia (1774–83, 1797–1803) and Katerynoslav vicegerency (1783–96). The left bank, along with the rest of the Crimean Khanate, was liberated from its vassal status to the Ottoman Empire (1774) and then annexed by the Russian Empire (1783) and re-named Tavriia oblast (1784), then merged into the New Russia gubernia (1796).

The area of present-day Kherson oblast was then divided between Kherson gubernia (1803–1921) on the Dnipro River’s right bank and Tavriia gubernia (1802–1918) on the left bank. The Nogay Tatars, who inhabited the left bank, were seen by the Russian government as sympathizers of the Turks during the Crimean War (1853–6) and were encouraged to leave for the Ottoman Empire.

Under Soviet rule it became part of Mykolaiv gubernia in 1921, Odesa gubernia in 1922, Kherson and Melitopol okruhas in 1925, Odesa oblast in 1932, and Mykolaiv oblast in 1937. A major factor in the development of Kherson oblast was the construction of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station and Kakhovka dam (1950–6), the creation of the Kakhovka Reservoir, and the construction of the distribution and irrigation canals to intensify agricultural production and grow its cities.

Population. The population of the oblast increased due to both in-migration and natural increase (in thousands, by years) from 743.0 (1939) to 807.0 (1956), 824.2 (1959), 1,030.0 (1970), 1,163.4 (1979), 1,237.0 (1989), reaching 1,271.6 in 1993; with ageing population (deaths outnumbering births since 1993) and net out-migration, it consistently declined: 1,271.0 (1994), 1,187.1 (2001), 1,086.8 (2011), and 1,000.5 (2022), of which 61.4 percent was urban (compared to 88.7 percent for Ukraine as a whole. Urbanization has been primarily a postwar phenomenon, rising from about 15 percent of the oblast’s population in the early 1930s to 22.4 percent (1939), 29.6 percent (1956), 40.4 percent (1959), 53.8 percent (1970), 58.2 percent (1979), 61.0 percent (1989), dipped slightly during economic downturn (1991–5) to 60.0 percent (2001) and then revived to 60.9 percent (2011), and 61.4 percent (2022).

The oblast has one large and 8 small cities. Six of them form two clusters, both on the Dnipro River: 1) Kherson (2022 population in 1,000s, 279.1), with nearby Oleshky (formerly Tsiurupynsk [or Tsiurupynske], 24.1) and Hola Prystan (13.5), and 2) Nova Kakhovka (or Nova Kakhivka, 44.4), with the adjacent Tavriisk (or Tavriiske, 10.1), Kakhovka (or Kakhivka, 34.7) and Beryslav (11.9). Outlying coastal cities are Henichesk (or Henicheske, 18.9, Sea of Azov) and Skadovsk (or Skadovske, 17.0, Black Sea). Rural population densities (persons per sq km) vary from 10 in the east to 40 in the west, notably near Kherson and Skadovsk.

The ethnic make-up of Kherson oblast (2001 census) is predominantly Ukrainian (82.0 percent) with a significant (14.1 percent) Russian minority. During the Second World War the smaller Jewish minority (in 1939 about 3 percent of the oblast’s but 16.7 percent of the Kherson city’s population) was decimated by the Nazi Germans. In the postwar period the share of Ukrainians (in percent) declined from 1959 (81.1) through 1970 (78.3), 1979 (76.7) and 1989 (75.7), while that of Russians rose from (15.6) to (18.1), (19.5), and (20.2), respectively. The share of Russians was greater in the urban areas, rising (in percent) from 1959 (22.7) to 1989 (24.9), than in rural areas, where it rose from (10.7) to (12.7). After the 1991 Ukraine’s Declaration of Independence the trend was reversed, with the share of Ukrainians (in percent of the total population) increasing by 2001 to (82.0) and of Russians declining to (14.1). Other ethnic groups in Kherson oblast were less than 1 percent each in 2001; the largest among them were Belarusians (0.7 percent) and Tatars (0.5 percent). Most ethnic Ukrainians (in percent) considered Ukrainian as their mother tongue (87.5 in 1959 and 87.0 in 2001) with some declaring Russian (12.4 in 1959 and 13.0 in 2001); by contrast, most ethnic Russians retained Russian as their mother tongue (98.8 in 1959 and 91.6 in 2001) and few adopted Ukrainian (1.0 in 1959 and 8.4 in 2001). With Ukraine’s independence after 1991 the schools of Kherson oblast increased teaching in Ukrainian language (the share of students taught in Ukrainian rose from 60 percent in 1995/96 to 76 percent in 2000/01 and 85 percent in 2009/10), but the population remained bilingual and Russian prevailed in business.

Politically, the population was strongly pro-Ukrainian. In the 1991 Ukrainian independence referendum, 90.1 percent of votes in Kherson oblast were in favor of the 1991 Ukraine’s Declaration of Independence. After Russian incursion into the Crimea and the Donbas in 2014, a survey conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology in December 2014 found that 90.9 percent of the oblast’s residents opposed their region joining the Russian Federation, 1 percent supported the idea, and the rest were undecided or did not respond.

Economy. Kherson oblast is a significant coastal region of Ukraine based on its natural and human resources for agriculture, industry, recreation, and transportation. With a territory occupying 4.7 percent and a population 2.4 percent of Ukraine’s total, its share of Ukraine’s gross national product in the 2004–13 period ranged between 1.7 and 2.1 percent. In 2008 Kherson oblast’s economic structure (as percent of its total value added by type of economic activity), exceeded the average for Ukraine in agriculture (22.5 vs 7.6), education (7.9 vs 5.1), state administration (7.3 vs 5.2), health services (4.5 vs 3.4), social services (2.5 vs 2.1), hospitality services (1.2 vs 1.1), and fishing (0.1 vs 0.0); slightly below average for Ukraine in trade (13.7 vs 15.3), transportation and communications (9.7 vs 10.1), and construction (3.1 vs 3.4), and well below average for manufacturing (15.9 vs 19.1), infrastructure development (5.6 vs 9.9), finance (3.6 vs 8.0), utilities (2.2 vs 3.4), and especially mining (0.2 vs 6.3).

Of Kherson oblast’s total work force of about 630,000 in the late 1980s, agriculture employed 28.3 percent, industry 25 percent, and various services less than 25 percent. By 2018, after industrial restructuring and expansion of services, its 448,000 workers were employed (as percent of its total workforce and in comparison to Ukraine as a whole) in the following sectors: 1) very important: agriculture, forestry, and fishing (30.4 vs 18.0 for Ukraine as a whole), 2) above average: arts, sport, and recreation (1.7 vs 1.2), 3) close to average: management (6.3 vs 5.7), education (8.6 vs 8.7), trade (22.1 vs 22.3), medical and social services (5.5 vs 6.1), finances and real estate (2.1 vs 2.9), but 4) well below average: administration and professional services (2.5 vs 4.6), information and communication (0.8 vs 1.7), construction (2.8 vs 4.1) and manufacturing (8.9 vs 14.8).

Industry. The oblast’s main industries in the 1980s were machine building and metalworking industry (30.6 percent of all output), light industry (23.1 percent), food production (20.7 percent), and fuel production (10.5 percent). With the demise of state orders, by 2000 machine building declined to 22.1 percent; cheaper imports of textiles, clothing, and footwear from abroad reduced light industry down to 4.4 percent; conversely, the share of food production rose to 39.3 percent by 2000. By 2021 food production settled at 38.4 percent; the diversification to produce green energy (bio and solar) increased fuel and energy production to 36.8 percent, non-metal fabrication increased to 8 percent, machine building and metalworking recovered slightly to 6.3 percent, woodworking, paper, and printing accounted for 5.5 percent, and other industries accounted for the remaining 5 percent.

In Kherson, until the Russian Federation’s invasion in 2022, large cargo ships, tankers, and other sea craft were built and repaired, and agricultural machines (combines, tractors), irrigation equipment, electric measuring devices, and electric equipment were made. Industrial engines and generators were made in Nova Kakhovka; electric-welding equipment, in Kakhovka. The food industry consists of processing and canning of fruit and vegetables (Kakhovka, Kherson, Myrne, Novooleksiivka, Nyzhni Sirohozy, and Skadovsk), flour milling (Kherson, Rubanivka, Velyka Lepetykha, Nova Kakhovka, Myrne) and large bakeries (Kherson, Nova Kakhovka, Beryslav, Skadovsk, Henichesk), meat packing (Nova Kakhovka, Kherson, Novotroitske), wine making (Nova Kakhovka, Beryslav, Odradokamianka, and the vicinity of Kherson at Bilozerka, Stanislav, and Oleshky), sea fishing and the processing and canning of fish (Skadovsk and Kherson), and the making of dairy products (Kherson, Nova Kakhovka, Skadovsk, Novotroitske), vegetable oil (Kherson, Marianske, Velyka Lepetykha, Skadovsk), and confectionery (Kherson). Cellulose for paper was processed in Oleshky, where the Kherson Fiberglass-Container Plant was the largest of its kind in Ukraine. In light industry, textile production predominated until the closure of the Kherson Cotton Textile Manufacturing Complex in 2013; shoes and clothing were made in Kherson, Henichesk, and Oleshky. Reinforced concrete, asphalt, bricks, and other building materials were made in Kherson, Nova Kakhovka, and Kakhovka; lime, in Bila Krynytsia and Arkhanhelske. Petroleum was refined in Kherson. Energy was provided by the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station (started production in 1955–56) and the Kherson Thermoelectric Central Station (1956). A biogas power station (2017) and a solar power plant (2019) were added in Kherson.

Agriculture. Kherson oblast has diverse agriculture with intensive grain growing, vegetable, melon, fruit and grape production, cattle for meat and milk production, sheep and poultry operations. It is particularly noted for vegetables (2nd after Kharkiv oblast) and melons. It contributed (in 2007 and 2013 [the year before the Russian Federation’s invasion of the Crimea and the Donbas], respectively) an increasing share (3.2 and 3.8 percent) of Ukraine’s agricultural production by value, and thus ranked 13th (3.6 percent) and 11th (4.3 percent) in crop production and moved from 23rd (2.6 percent) to 16th (3.0 percent) in animal husbandry. As in all of Ukraine, since 1991 the costly animal husbandry component declined in favor of the more lucrative crops, like sunflower seeds, for export.

Collective farms and state farms were replaced, after 1991, by farming associations, corporate farms, and commercial family farms. Whereas in 1983 there were 145 state farms and 147 collective farms in the oblast, post-Soviet agricultural reforms led to their break-up and re-structuring. By 1995 the state farms were fragmented to 235, the collective farms to 183, while 20 farming co-operatives, 1 joint-stock company, and 2,676 commercial family farms were added for a total of 3,115 commercial farms of various sizes. By 2005 the total of commercial farms consolidated to 3,073, comprising 20 state farms, no collective farms, but 227 farming companies, 137 private companies, 33 co-operatives, 2,589 family farms, and 67 other types of farms. Meanwhile, rural households (318 thousand in 1995) continued to practice subsistence gardening and subsidiary animal husbandry on their individual small plots of land.

Farming enterprises and rural households had, in 1983, 2,190,000 ha of land at their disposal; 1,964,000 ha were used directly for agriculture: of this 88.8 percent was cultivated, 7.9 percent was pasture, and 0.7 percent was hayfield. Shelterbelts were planted to reduce wind erosion. Irrigated land constituted 397,100 ha (70,000 ha in 1963). Sprinkler technology increased total irrigable land to 1,783,000 ha by 1990.

Over time, the availability of land used directly for agriculture declined (but an increasing share of it was cultivated): 1,958,300 ha in 1990 (of which 89.5 percent was cultivated) to 1,766,500 ha in 2000 and 1,760,600 ha in 2007 (of which 94.0 were cultivated). By 2009 1,758,500 ha were used directly in agriculture (of which 93.6 percent were cultivated), of which 932,000 ha were used by commercial farms and 826,500 ha by rural households. Total cultivated land also declined: from 1,745,000 ha in 1983 and 1,752,400 ha in 1990 to 1,646,100 ha in 2009.

In the Soviet period, of the total sown area of 1,640,600 ha in 1976, grain crops took up 48 percent; fodder crops, 39.2 percent; industrial crops, 8.1 percent; and garden vegetables, melons, and potatoes, 4.4 percent. By 1983 total sown area declined to 1,598,000 ha, with grains, 53 percent of which was wheat, the other grains included barley, corn, millet, legumes, and rice (on irrigated land); feed crops, like alfalfa; industrial crops, 62.5 percent of which were sunflowers; vegetables, notably tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, squash and melons. Of permanent plantings, vineyards took up 26,700 ha, and fruit orchards (apricots, peaches, cherries, quinces, plums, apples, pears), 15,600ha.

Between 2008 and 2020 the sown area varied between 1,324,100 ha (2012) and 1,438,000 ha (2017), most recently 1,433,700 ha (2019) and 1,420,000 ha (2020). As some crops for export became more profitable, their share in the value of total agricultural production rose from 44.1 percent in 1990 to 63.6 percent in 2000, 82.0 percent in 2015 and 86.8 percent in 2020. The main grains sown in 2019 and 2020 were: winter wheat (482,900 and 491,700 ha or 63.9 and 63.1 percent of all grains sown (755,900 and 779,000 ha), followed by barley (193,100 and 196,300 ha or 25.5 and 25.2 percent). Of all the industrial crops sown (526,400 and 491,000 ha), sunflower occupied 353,000 and 335,300 ha (or 67.1 and 68.3 percent), while rape 87,500 and 89,700 ha (or 16.6 and 18.2 percent), and soybean 87,600 and 76,800 ha (or 16.6 and 15.6 percent) vied for 2nd or 3rd place. The sown areas of staples, potatoes and vegetables, declined with the decline of local population: 85,200 ha in 2019 and 85,000 ha in 2020, of which potatoes occupied 22,300 ha (2019) and 22,200 ha (2020). The sown area of all fodder crops dropped from 548,000 ha (34.7 percent of the total sown area) in 1990 to 81,700 ha (6.0 percent of the total sown area) in 2008 and 66,200 ha (4.6 percent of the total sown area) by 2019. Fruit orchards occupied 8,300 ha (2019). Irrigated land also declined from 1,783,000 ha in 1990 to 855,000 ha in 1995 and 499,000 ha in 2000, then increased to another peak at 1, 203,000 ha in 2017. Although irrigation assured better crop yields, in the long run it led to soil salinization.

Animal husbandry consisted primarily of dairy and beef cattle farming, but also of pig, sheep, poultry, fish, and silkworm farming. Its production, as percent of the total value of agricultural output, however, dropped precipitously from 55.9 percent in 1990 to 36.4 percent in 2000, 18.0 percent (2015) and 13.2 percent (2020). This was precipitated by the post-Soviet economic crisis with skyrocketing cost of animal husbandry and a domestic drop in demand for animal products. Specifically, the numbers of cattle (of which, cows) declined from 866,000 (272,200) in 1990 to 237,000 (122,500) in 2000, 122,100 (78,700) in 2010 and 66,400 in 2020 (43,400); of pigs, from 988,100 (1990) to 228,400 (2000), 205,500 (2010), and 99,000 (2020); of sheep and goats, from 914,100 (1990) to 89,400 (2000), 63,300 (2010), and 23,900 (2020). Only poultry, after a decline, experienced a short commercial boom (the redevelopment and expansion of the largest chicken factory in Ukraine at Chornobaivka NW of Kherson, then a setback, and then the death of its 4.4 million chickens with the Russian invasion in 2022): 6,587,800 (1990), 3,504,400 (2000), 3,890,200 (2010), 11,065,900 (2013), 5,318,900 (2020), and 298,500 (2022).

Transportation. In 1983 there were 456 km of railroad tracks, consolidated by 2020 to 453 km. Trunklines (single track, non-electrified) crossing the oblast include the Kherson–Dnipro, Kherson–Simferopol, Kherson–Mykolaiv, and Mykolaiv–Kakhovka–Fedorivka–Volnovakha lines. Kherson is the only major railway junction in the oblast. There were in 1983 5,300 km of roads, of which 4,500 were paved; by 2020 the roads were consolidated to 5,000 km, all of which were paved. Three main highways cross the oblast: 1) in the east, Moscow–Kharkiv–Zaporizhia–Simferopol (E 105), 2) through the center, from east to west, Rostov–Mariupol–Melitopol–Kherson–Odesa (M 14), and 3) Kherson–Dzhankoi–Kerch–Sochi (E 97). Kherson has an airport. The Russian invasion and frontline combat have destroyed the railway and highway bridges crossing the Dnipro River and made the airport inoperable. Kherson, Skadovsk, and Henichesk are important seaports; ships and barges sailing up the Dnipro River stopped at the river ports of Kherson, Nova Kakhovka, Beryslav, and Velyka Lepetykha.

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Ihor Stebelsky

[This article was updated in 2025.]