Zealand Region (; ) is the southernmost administrative region of Denmark, established on January 1, 2007 as part of the 2007 Danish Municipal Reform, which replaced the traditional counties ("amter") with five larger regions. At the same time, smaller municipalities were merged into larger units, reducing the number of municipalities from 271 before 1 January 2006, when Ærø Municipality was created, to 98. The reform was implemented in Denmark on January 1, 2007.