Rivne Oblast (sometimes also Rovno Oblast; Ukrainian: Рівненська область, translit. Rivnens’ka oblast’; also referred to as Rivnenshchyna - Ukrainian: Рівненщина) is an oblast (province) of Ukraine. Its administrative center is Rivne. The area of the region is 20,100 km²; its population (as of 2004-05-01) is 1.2 million. The Rivne Oblast was created as part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic on December 4, 1939. A nuclear power plant is located in the oblast.

Detailed map of Rivne Oblast

Subdivisions of Rivne Oblast

The Rivne Oblast is administratively subdivided into 16 raions (districts) as well as 4 cities (municipalities) which are directly subordinate to the oblast government: Dubno, Kuznetsovsk, Ostroh, and the administrative center of the oblast, Rivne.

Rivne is one of the regions with the highest birth rate in all of Ukraine. The heavy rural (about two thirds of the population is rural) and ethnic Ukrainian (close to 95%) composition of the population might be responsible for this. However the birth rate is not uniform across Rivne, with raions like Ostroh having extremely low birth rates (9.7 per 1000) and other raions like Rokytnivskyi having extremely high birth rates (24.0 per 1000).

Rivne (Ukrainian: Рівне) or Rovno (Polish: Równe; Russian: Ровно; Yiddish: ראָוונע) is a historic city in western Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Rivne Oblast (province), as well as the administrative center of the surrounding Rivne Raion (district) within the oblast.

Rivne is an important transportation hub, with the international Rivne Airport, and rail links to Zdolbuniv, Sarny and Kovel, as well as highways linking it with Brest, Kiev and Lviv.

The estimated population was around 247,750 as of 2010.

Rivne was first mentioned in 1283 as one of the inhabited places of Halych-Volhynia. From the second half of the 14th century it was under the Great Duchy of Lithuania and from 1569 in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In 1492 the city was granted Magdeburg rights. Following the partition of Poland, in 1793 Rivne became a part of Russian Empire, and in 1797 it was declared as a regional town of the Volhynian Governorate.

During World War I and the period of chaos shortly after, it was briefly under German, Ukrainian, Bolshevik, and Polish forces. In April–May 1919 Rivne served as the temporary capital of Ukrainian People's Republic. At the conclusion of the conflict, in accordance with the Riga Peace Treaty of 1921 it became a part of Polish Volhynian Voivodeship for the period between the two World Wars.