Le Golfe-du-Saint-Laurent is a Regional county municipality in the Côte-Nord region of far-eastern Quebec, Canada. It includes all the communities along the Gulf of Saint Lawrence between the Natashquan River and the Newfoundland and Labrador border. It has an area of 63,017.16 square kilometres (24,331.06 sq mi) according to Quebec's Ministère des Affaires Municipales, Régions et Occupation du territoire (which includes the disputed land within Labrador), or a land area of 43,337.1 square kilometres (16,732.5 sq mi) according to Statistics Canada.
Le Golfe-du-Saint-Laurent was formed in July 2010. It supersedes the Basse-Côte-Nord territory and includes the Petit-Mécatina Unorganized Territory that was transferred from the Minganie Regional County Municipality at that time.[1] Together with Minganie RCM, it forms the census division of Minganie-Basse-Côte-Nord, whose geographical code is 98.
The regional county is characterized by the absence of road connections between the villages that are spread out along its 375 kilometres (233 mi) shoreline of the gulf. Except for Blanc-Sablon, all communities are only accessible by boat or plane, although Quebec Route 138 is being planned to extend all along the coast. Since the early 1990s, the region's commercial fishing industry has seen a steep decline, but a tourism industry is being developed to promote hunting and fishing outfitters, among other activities.[2]
Le Golfe-du-Saint-Laurent consists of the following subdivisions, with their codes in parentheses:
The following First Nations reserves are within the regional county, but administratively not part of it:
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