the French, who first used the word Qubec in a broader sense. Provincial Fact Sheets Qubec Places, Map Click and drag the map to move it around. Southern Qubec Places Click and drag the map to move it around. Land and Resources The province of Qubec is composed of 3 main geological regions: the St Lawrence River valley, the Canadian SHIELD and the Appalachian region. The St Lawrence River Valley is the most fertile and developed region. The majority of the population of Qubec lives here, mainly between Montral and Qubec City. The Canadian Shield covers most of Qubec territory from approximately 80 km north of the St Lawrence River valley up to the Ungava region. It is a vast region composed of thousands of lakes and thousands of square kilometres of forested area. On the south bank of the St Lawrence River, between the Rivire Richelieu and the Gasp Peninsula, is the Qubec part of the Appalachian mountain chain which extends from Gasp south to Alabama. Glaciers covered the entire territory of the province during the Quaternary period. The deglaciation began only 15 000 years ago and is mainly responsible for the formation of thousands of lakes, for which the province of Qubec is famous. Most of the territory has an elevation between 300 and 600 m above sea level. Only 7% of the territory is above 600 m while the highest mountains are Mont D'Iberville (1652 m) in the Torgnat Mountains in northern Qubec and Mont Jacques-Cartier (1268