staffordshire

olspan=2 align=center bgcolor="#ff9999"\|Staffordshire
olspan=2 align=center\|
olspan=2 bgcolor="#ff9999"\|Geography
idth="45%"\|Status:	Ceremonial & (smaller) Administrative County
egion:	West Midlands
a href="/encyclopedia/Surface-area" title="Surface area">Area: - Total - Admin. council - Admin. area	Ranked 18th 2,713 km² Ranked 18th 2,620 km²
dmin HQ:	Stafford
SO 3166-2:	GB-STS
a href="/encyclopedia/ONS-coding-system" title="ONS coding system">ONS code:	41
a href="/encyclopedia/Nomenclature-of-Territorial-Units-for-Statistics" title="Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics">NUTS 3:	UKG24
olspan=2 bgcolor="#ff9999"\|Demographics
a href="/encyclopedia/Population" title="Population">Population: - Total (2002 est.) - Density - Admin. council - Admin. pop.	Ranked 15th 1,047,528 386 / km² Ranked 7th 808,952
thnicity:	97.0% White 1.7% S.Asian
olspan=2 bgcolor="#ff9999"\|Politics
olspan=2 align=center\| Staffordshire County Council http://www.staffordshire.gov.uk/
xecutive:	Labour
olspan=2 align=center\|Members of Parliament
olspan=2\|Charlotte Atkins, William Cash, Patrick Cormack, Janet Dean, Michael Fabricant, Paul Farrelly, Mark Fisher, Brian Jenkins, David Kidney, George Stevenson, Joan Walley, Tony Wright
olspan=2 bgcolor="#ff9999"\|Districts
olspan=2\| Tamworth Lichfield Cannock Chase South Staffordshire Stafford Newcastle-under-Lyme Staffordshire Moorlands East Staffordshire Stoke-on-Trent (Unitary)

Staffordshire (abbreviated Staffs) is a landlocked county in the Midlands of England. The county town is Stafford. Part of the National Forest lies within its borders. It adjoins the ceremonial counties of Cheshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, West Midlands and Shropshire. Major conurbations in Staffordshire include Stoke-on-Trent, Burton-upon-Trent, Lichfield, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Tamworth and Stafford itself. Staffordshire is divided into a number of districts. These are Cannock Chase, East Staffordshire, Lichfield, Newcastle-under-Lyme, South Staffordshire, Stafford, Staffordshire Moorlands and Tamworth. Stoke-on-Trent is administered as a separate unitary authority.

History

Main article History of Staffordshire. The historic county of Staffordshire included Wolverhampton, Walsall, and West Bromwich, these were removed in 1974 to the new county of West Midlands. The resulting administrative area of Staffordshire has a narrow southwards protrusion that runs west of West Midlands to the border of Worcestershire. Further, Stoke-on-Trent was removed in the 1990s to form a unitary authority, but is still considered part of Staffordshire for ceremonial purposes. Historically, Staffordshire was divided into the five hundreds of Cuttlestone, Offlow, Pirehill, Seisdon and Totmonslow.

Geography

In the north and in the south the county is hilly, with wild moorlands in the north and Cannock Chase an area of natural beauty in the south. In the midland regions the surface is low and undulating. Throughout the entire county there are vast and important coal fields. In the southern part there are also rich iron ore deposits. The largest river is the Trent. The soil is chiefly clay and agriculture was not highly developed.