Gers

The Gers (; Template:Langx or , ) is a department in the region of Occitania, Southwestern France. The Gers is bordered by the departments of Hautes-Pyrénées and Pyrénées-Atlantiques to the south, Haute-Garonne and Tarn-et-Garonne to the east, Lot-et-Garonne to the north and Landes to the west. Named after the Gers River, its inhabitants are called the Gersois and Gersoises in French. In 2023, it had a population of 192,645.

History

The Gers is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was created from parts of the former provinces of Guyenne and Gascony. In 1808 it lost Lavit on its north-eastern side to the newly created department of Tarn-et-Garonne.

Culture

The culture is largely agricultural, with great emphasis on the local gastronomical specialties such as:

• Armagnac brandy;
• Côtes de Gascogne;
• Floc de Gascogne;
• Foie gras;
• Wild mushrooms.

Also, some prominent cultivated crops are maize, colza, sunflowers and grain.

The Gascon language is a dialect of Occitan, but it is not widely spoken. The department is characterised by sleepy bastide villages and rolling hills with the Pyrenees visible to the south. Alexandre Dumas, père created the famous Gersois d'Artagnan, the fourth musketeer of The Three Musketeers. A museum to d'Artagnan is found in the Gersois village of Lupiac.

A horse race at the Auteuil Hippodrome has been named after André Boingnères, a notable local race-horse owner and the successful Mayor of Termes-d'Armagnac between 1951 and 1976.

Politics

Departmental Council of Gers

The President of the Departmental Council of the Gers has been Philippe Dupouy of the Socialist Party since 2022. He succeeded Philippe Martin, also from the Socialist Party, who had been in office since 2014. The assembly comprises 34 seats, allocated as follows since the 2015 departmental elections:

Party		Seats
style="background-color: Template:Party color" |•	Socialist Party	22
style="background-color: Template:Party color" |	The Republicans	12

Members of the National Assembly

The Gers elected the following members of the National Assembly during the 2017 legislative election:

Constituency		Member	Party
style="background-color: Template:Party color" |	Gers's 1st constituency	Jean-René Cazeneuve	Renaissance
style="background-color: Template:Party color" |	Gers's 2nd constituency	David Taupiac	Socialist Party

Demography

Located in Southwestern France, the Gers is amongst the least densely populated (31 people/km² in 2023), least urban, or most rural, areas in all of Western Europe. As of 2023, there are 9 communes with more than 3,000 inhabitants:

Commune	Population (2023)
Auch	22,428
L'Isle-Jourdain	9,537
Condom	6,473
Fleurance	6,247
Eauze	4,108
Lectoure	3,670
Vic-Fezensac	3,577
Mirande	3,457
Gimont	3,146

Climate

Annual rainfall varies from more than 900 mm in the south-west of the department, to less than 700 mm in the North-East (Auch, Condom, Lectoure).

Winters are overall mild, with only occasional freezing temperatures. Summers are hot and dry. Together with Toulouse, Nîmes, Carpentras, Ajaccio, Marseille,Toulon and Perpignan, Auch is one of the hottest cities in France.

Tourism

According to recent data tourism represents annually:

• 610,000 tourists,
• 5,900,000 nights,
• 22,100 commercial beds,
• 2,400 tourism-related jobs,
• Tourists account for an equivalent of 17,100 permanent inhabitants,
• their estimated expenditure is €141,000,000.

• Auch
  Auch
• Montréal, Gers
  Montréal, Gers
• Larressingle
  Larressingle
• Barran
  Barran
• Armagnac
  Armagnac
• Moulard duck foie gras with pickled pear
  Moulard duck foie gras with pickled pear

See also

• Cantons of the Gers department
• Communes of the Gers department
• Arrondissements of the Gers department

External links

• Template:In lang Departmental Council website
• Template:In lang Prefecture website
• Welcome to the Gers in Gascony Tourisme Gers - Vos vacances en France dans le Gers, coeur du Sud Ouest et de l'Occitanie