La Foa

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Commune of La Foa
Location
Coordinates	21°31′″S, 165°57′″E
Administration
Country	France
Sui generis collectivity	New Caledonia
Province	South Province
Mayor	Philippe Gomès
Statistics
Altitude	0 m–1,058 m (avg. 20 m)
Land area¹	464.0 km²
Population² (2004 census)	2,903
- Density (2004 census)	6.3/km²
- Ethnic distribution   (1996 census)	Europeans 48.8% Kanaks 33.0% Polynesians 13.8% Other 4.4%
Miscellaneous
INSEE/Postal code	98813/ 98880
¹ New Caledonia Land Register (DITTT) data, which exclude lakes and ponds larger than 1 km² (0.386 sq. mi. or 247 acres) as well as the estuaries of rivers.
² Population sans doubles comptes: single count of residents of multiple communes (e.g. students and military personnel).

La Foa is a commune in the South Province of New Caledonia, an overseas territory of France in the Pacific Ocean.

Although the provincial seat of the South Province is in Nouméa, La Foa was made the chief town of the administrative subdivision of the South in order to counterbalance the overwhelming weight of Nouméa in New Caledonia. Both entities share an almost identical territory, but their status and role is quite different: the South Province, with its provincial assembly in Nouméa, is a full political division, whereas the administrative subdivision of the South is only an administrative division of the French central state, akin to an arrondissement of Metropolitan France, with a Deputy Commissioner of the Republic (commissaire délégué de la République), akin to a subprefect of metropolitan France, in residence in La Foa.