Talca Province is one of four provinces

Provinces of Chile

A province is the second largest administrative division in Chile, after a region. Each region is divided into provinces. There are 54 provinces in total....

 of the central Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

an region of Maule

Maule Region

The VII Maule Region is one of Chile's 15 first order administrative divisions. Its capital is Talca. The region takes its name from the Maule River which, running westward from the Andes, bisects the region and spans a basin of about 20,600 km2...

 (VII). Its capital is the city of Talca.

Administration

As a province, Talca is a second-level administrative division

Administrative divisions of Chile

The administrative division or territorial organization of Chile exemplifies characteristics of a unitary state. State administration is functionally and geographically decentralized, as appropriate for each authority in accordance with the law....

 of Chile, governed by a provincial governor

Governor

A governor is a governing official, usually the executive of a non-sovereign level of government, ranking under the head of state...

 who is appointed by the president

President of Chile

The President of the Republic of Chile is both the head of state and the head of government of the Republic of Chile. The President is responsible of the government and state administration...

.

Communes

The province comprises ten communes, each governed by a municipality consisting of an alcalde

Alcalde

Alcalde , or Alcalde ordinario, is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An alcalde was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian cabildo and judge of first instance of a town...

 and municipal council

Municipal council

A municipal council is the local government of a municipality. Specifically the term can refer to the institutions of various countries that can be translated by this term...

.

• Talca
  Talca
  Talca is a city and commune in Chile located about south of Santiago, and is the capital of both Talca Province and Maule Region . As of the 2002 census, the city had a population of 193,755....
  
  
• San Clemente
  San Clemente, Chile
  San Clemente is a city and commune administered by the municipality of San Clemente, located in the Talca Province of Chile's Maule Region.-Demographics:...
  
  
• Pelarco
  Pelarco
  Pelarco is a town and commune in Talca Province, Maule Region of Chile. The commune spans an area of .-Demographics:According to data from the 2002 Census of Population and Housing, Pelarco had 7,266 inhabitants; of these, 1,822 lived in urban areas and 5,444 in rural areas. At that time, there...
  
  
• Pencahue
  Pencahue
  Pencahue is a town and commune in Chile, located in Talca Province, in the seventh region of Maule. The commune spans and area of .Also there are another three places called Pencahue, near to San Vicente de Tagua Tagua, Sexta Región, Chile...
  
  
• Maule
• San Rafael
  San Rafael, Chile
  San Rafael is a town and commune of the Talca Province in the Maule Region of Chile. The town serves as the communal capital.-Demographics:According to the 2002 census of the National Statistics Institute, San Rafael spans an area of and has 7,674 inhabitants . Of these, 3,482 lived in urban...
  
  
• Curepto
  Curepto
  Curepto is a town and commune in the Chilean Province of Talca, located in the VII Maule Region. The commune spans an area of .-Culture:The town has many examples of Chilean rural colonial architecture. Its parish church is a quintessential example of a traditional religious building in the...
  
  
• Constitución
  Constitución, Chile
  Constitución is a seaside resort, industrial city, minor port and commune in Chile, located in the Maule Region, Talca Province.-History:-8.8 magnitude 2010 earthquake:...
  
  
• Empedrado
• Río Claro

Geography and demography

According to the 2002 census by the National Statistics Institute

National Statistics Institute (Chile)

The National Statistics Institute of Chile is a state-run organization of the Government of Chile, created in the second half of the 19th century and tasked with performing a general census of population and housing, then collecting, producing and publishing official demographic statistics of...

(INE), the province spans an area of 9937.8 sqkm and had a population of 352,966 inhabitants (174,734 men and 178,232 women), giving it a population density of 35.5 PD/sqkm. Between the 1992 and 2002 censuses, the population grew by 12.4% (39,015 persons).