General Carrera 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 southern 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 Aisen (XI). Its capital city is Chile Chico

Chile Chico

Chile Chico is a town in General Carrera Province, Aisén Region, Patagonia, Chile. It is located on the south shore of General Carrera Lake...

.

Administration

As a province, General Carrera 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....

, governed by a provincial governor 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...

. The province comprises two communes, Río Ibáñez

Río Ibáñez, Chile

Río Ibáñez is a commune in General Carrera Province, Aisén Region, Chile. It is named after Ibáñez River, a major tributary of General Carrera Lake....

 and Chile Chico

Chile Chico

Chile Chico is a town in General Carrera Province, Aisén Region, Patagonia, Chile. It is located on the south shore of General Carrera Lake...

; each is governed by a municipality, headed by 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...

.

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 11919.5 sqkm and had a population of 6,921 inhabitants (3,735 men and 3,186 women), giving it a population density of 0.6 PD/sqkm. It is the sixth least populated province in the country. Of these, 3,042 (44%) lived in urban areas and 3,879 (56%) in rural areas. Between the 1992 and 2002 censuses, the population grew by 6% (392 persons).