Herefordshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the West Midlands of England, bordered by Shropshire to the north, Worcestershire to the east, Gloucestershire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Monmouthshire and Powys to the west. The city of Hereford is the largest settlement.
The county is rural, with an area of and an estimated population of in . Hereford is near the centre of the county, and other settlements include Leominster in the north, Ledbury in the east, and Ross-on-Wye in the south. For local government purposes Herefordshire is a unitary authority area.
The centre of Herefordshire is lowland which is crossed by the River Wye and its tributary, the Lugg. To the east are the Malvern Hills, a national landscape, which straddle the boundary with Worcestershire. The south of the county contains the northern part of the Wye Valley, also a national landscape, which stretches into Wales. In the west, the ground rises to the Black Mountains range; this contains the Black Mountain (), which lies on the Powys border and is the highest point in the county, at .
The county is in the historic Welsh Marches. The land use is mostly agricultural, and the county is known for its fruit and cider production, and for the Hereford cattle breed.
Physical geography
The River Wye, which at is the fourth-longest in the United Kingdom, enters the county after briefly being its border with Powys. It flows through both Hereford and Ross-on-Wye before returning to Wales. Leominster is on the River Lugg, a tributary of the Wye.
There are two Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the county. The Wye Valley is in the river's valleys south of Hereford, while the Malvern Hills are in the east of the county, along its border with Worcestershire.
The county is notably hilly. The following summits lie in the county and are above 300 metres (984 ft) with more than 30 metres (98 ft) of prominence:
History
Herefordshire is one of the 39 historic counties of England. Herefordshire County Council was created in 1889.
In 1974, the administrative county formed in 1889 was merged with that of neighbouring Worcestershire to form Hereford and Worcester. Within this, Herefordshire was covered by the local government districts of South Herefordshire, Hereford, and part of Malvern Hills and Leominster districts. However, the county was dissolved in 1998, resulting in the return of Herefordshire and Worcestershire as counties.
The county and unitary authority created in 1998 has almost identical borders to the pre-1974 county; a small area at Park Wood had been transferred from Mathon to West Malvern in 1986 and so went to Worcestershire rather than Herefordshire in 1998, but otherwise the re-established border between the two counties was identical to the pre-1974 boundary.
Constitution From 1974 to 1998, Herefordshire was part of the former non-metropolitan county of Hereford and Worcester.
Herefordshire was reconstituted both as a new district as "County of Herefordshire" and as a new county (coextensive with the area of the aforementioned district) (effective 1 April 1998) by Statutory Instrument as defined in The Hereford and Worcester (Structural, Boundary and Electoral Changes) Order 1996. This Order established Herefordshire as a unitary authority on 1 April 1998, combining county and district functions into a single council. Herefordshire is also commonly called a unitary district, but this is not official nomenclature. Herefordshire is officially known as a unitary authority for local government purposes. It is governed by Herefordshire Council which was created in 1998 with the new unitary district that absorbed the previous administrative areas of Hereford City Council, South Herefordshire District Council, most of Leominster District Council, and part of Malvern Hills District Council, all within the previous non-metropolitan county of Hereford and Worcester, whose functions the new authority inherited within its area.Official Hereford Council website . Retrieved 21 May 2009. The remainder of Malvern Hills district absorbed the Worcestershire part of Leominster district (the area around Tenbury Wells) and continued to constitute a (smaller) district within the new two-tier county of Worcestershire.
The Lieutenancies Act 1997 made Herefordshire a ceremonial county, covering the exact area of the unitary district. For Eurostat purposes it is a NUTS 3 region (code UKG11) and is one of three counties that comprise the "Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire" NUTS 2 region.
Demographics
In Herefordshire, the population size has increased by 2.0%, from around 183,500 in 2011 to 187,100 in 2021. This is lower than the overall increase for England (6.6%), where the population grew by nearly 3.5 million to 56,489,800.
As of the 2021 census, 91.1% of the population identified as 'White British', and 5.1% as 'White Other'. The 'White Other' group is largely made up of migrants from central and Eastern Europe who began moving into the county in the early 2000s, initially for agricultural work, but more recently to work in other sectors such as health care, catering and hospitality. Poland and Romania are the two most common non-UK countries of birth for foreign born people in Herefordshire.
Travellers Roma and Travellers have historically been Herefordshire's largest minority ethnic group. They are made up of three main groups: Romanichal or Romani Irish Travellers New Travellers or New Age Travellers
As of the 2021 census, they number 600 people, at around 0.2% of the county's population.
The Roma and Irish Travellers fall within the definition of a minority ethnic group under the Race Relations Amendment Act (2000). There were approximately 400 people (0.2%) within this minority group in the county at the 2011 Census.
Economy Bulmers Cider in Hereford is the world's largest cider factory, and has the world's largest vat (for Strongbow), built in 1975. Painter Brothers (part of Balfour Beatty) in the north of Hereford, is the UK's largest manufacturer of electricity pylons (transmission towers), broadcasting masts, the Callender-Hamilton bridge, and rail electrification structures. Special Metals Wiggin, part of Special Metals Corporation, based at Hereford was the main producer of nickel alloys in Europe, with a large site directly north of Painter Brothers. Cargill Meats Europe (formerly Sun Valley) have a large poultry meat processing facility, processing chickens from around Herefordshire.
Cadbury (Mondelēz International) make milk chocolate crumb near Marlbrook (near Leominster). Weston's Cider is in Much Marcle, who also make Stowford Press. Wye Fruit Ltd is in the north of Ledbury on the B4214 and is a large site of Amcor, and further west is Universal Beverages (UBL), owned by Heineken since 2007 where it cans cider. The site of Ledbury Preserves of RHM made Robertson's jam, mincemeat and marmalade and closed in 2008 when production moved to Cambridgeshire. Holden Aluminium Technologies are a sports car chassis manufacturer at Linton. Kingspan Insulation is based at Pembridge. BT's Madley Communications Centre, claims to be the world's largest earth station. Tyrrells Potato Crisps are at Dilwyn west of Leominster.
This is a chart of trend of regional gross value added of Herefordshire at current basic prices published by the Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling. Year Regional Gross Value Added Agriculture Industry Services 1995 1,622 218 567 836 2000 1,885 155 643 1,087 2003 2,216 185 708 1,323
includes hunting and forestry
includes energy and construction
includes financial intermediation services indirectly measured
Components may not sum to totals due to rounding
Many well-known cider producers are based in Herefordshire. These include Weston's cider of Much Marcle, and Bulmer's cider, from Hereford, which produces the UK market leader Strongbow.
Cities, towns and villages
The major settlements in the county include Hereford, which is the county town and Herefordshire's only city, as well as the towns of Leominster, Ledbury, Ross-on-Wye, Kington and Bromyard.
Employment Most employment in Herefordshire is in agriculture, manufacturing and services. According to Herefordshire Council's online document "worklessness", 10% of people are unemployed in Herefordshire including out-of-work, homeless, ill and disabled and their carers. Cargill Meats and H. P. Bulmers are two of the largest private sector employers, with the Council and NHS being the largest public sector employers.
Politics
Westminster Parliamentary
There are two parliamentary constituencies in Herefordshire. , Ellie Chowns, a member of the Green Party, represents North Herefordshire and Jesse Norman, a member of the Conservative Party, represents Hereford and South Herefordshire.
Council
The council operates a cabinet-style council and has been independently controlled since 2019. The chairman is Sebastian Bowen and the leader of the council is David Hitchiner.
The cabinet leader is appointed yearly by the full council of 53 councillors. The cabinet leader then picks their deputy and up to eight other councillors to form the executive cabinet. Each cabinet member makes the decisions about the portfolio that they are allocated. Elections to the council are held every four years. Elections are conducted under the FPTP system with the 53 wards returning one councillor each. Elections have been held in 2000, 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019, 2023, with the next election to be held in 2027.
In the 2019 election, the Conservatives lost control of Herefordshire Council. This remained true for the 2023 local elections in Herefordshire.
Education
Herefordshire has a comprehensive education system that also includes several independent schools. Most state secondary schools are for ages 11–16. Providers of further and higher education in the county include Hereford College of Arts, Hereford College of Education, Hereford Sixth Form College, Herefordshire and Ludlow College, Royal National College for the Blind, NMITE and Herefordshire and Worcestershire Group Training Association (HWGTA).
Agriculture The agricultural economy has changed greatly in recent years within the county. The county is on the western edge of England which has been historically pastoral as opposed to the east which was more arable.
Beef
Probably Hereford's most famous export is its Hereford beef cattle. Herefords are docile but extremely hardy creatures and these attributes have led to their proliferation across the world, particularly the US, Canada, South America and Australia. The breed is so gentle that a Hereford bull was used as the mascot for Hereford United Football Club for many years, led around the club's Edgar Street ground before major matches.
Fruit
The county is famous for its apple and pear orchards, and its cider. There are many orchards around the county but not as many as there once were.
In the last few years, soft fruits such as strawberries have become a new and rapidly expanding area of the agricultural economy of the county. One of the main reasons for this was the introduction of the polytunnel or French tunnel. This allows the strawberries to be grown for a far longer season and with a higher quality (with no blemishes from the rain). The strawberries are mainly picked by Eastern European workers who come over for the season and often earn more money than they could working in their own country and with the bonus, for many of them, of learning or improving their English. The polytunnels have been a major issue in the county, as some people see them as a "blot on the landscape".
Although some polytunnel sites are illegal, Herefordshire Council has turned a blind eye in the belief that agriculture must be allowed to innovate; otherwise it will stagnate and the county will suffer.
Dairy