Veliko Turnovo District

an administrative and territorial unit in northern Bulgaria, in the basin of the Iantra River. Area, 4,700 sq km; population, 335,000 (1968). The administrative center is Veliko Turnovo. Svishtov is its port on the Danube.

The southern part of the district is situated in the Stara Planina (Balkan Mountains), which become the hilly Lower Danubian Plain in the north. The average January temperature in the region is - 1° to -3° C; the average July temperature, 22°-24° C. Yearly precipitation varies from 500 mm near the Danube to 1,000 mm in the mountains. There is predominantly forest-steppe landscape in the north and forest landscape in the south.

Industry is the main branch of the district’s economy. The most important branches of industry are machine building and metalworking (construction and road machines in Debeleis, lifting and transport equipment in Görna Oriakhovitsa, and motor building and radio engineering in Veliko Turnovo). There is also canning, sugar refining, wine-making, textile, timber, and chemical industry (a cellulose and artificial-fibers combine in Svishtov). There is intensive agriculture; about one-quarter of the cultivated area is irrigated. Veliko Turnovo District is a leader in Bulgaria in the production of sugar beets (over 300,000 tons in 1967), as well as of grapes and vegetables (traditional sectors of Bulgarian agriculture, whose production is exported). The chief grains grown are wheat, corn, and barley. Cattle, pigs, and sheep are also raised.