Chinese Embassies Worldwide - beginning with letters:
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The People's Republic of China (PRC), commonly known
as China (pinyin: Zhonghuá Rénmín Gònghéguó),
is the largest country in East Asia, with a smaller proportion of
its area located in Central Asia. Due to its huge and stable population,
its rapidly growing economy, its large research and development investments
and military spending, and other capabilities, the PRC is often considered
by analysts and commentators as an emerging superpower.
At over 3.7 million square miles (over 9.5 million km²), the
PRC is the third or fourth largest country by area. The PRC's landscape
is extremely varied with largely desert on the north and humid and
mountainous on the east and largely dry and arid on the western
part of the country. It is also the world's most populous nation,
with over 1.3 billion citizens. The present-day location of PRC
was the birthplace of the Chinese civilization that dates back to
at least 18th century BC. The PRC was officially founded as a state
on October 1, 1949 in Beijing, its capital, during the closing stages
of the Chinese Civil War.
The PRC is currently the world's fourth largest economy and second
largest at purchasing power parity, third largest exporter and importer,
consumes a third of the world's steel and almost half of the world's
concrete, and represents China as a permanent member of the UN Security
Council and APEC. China is the largest trading partner of every
country in East Asia.
Background
Around the time it was officially founded, the Republic
of China (ROC), retreated to the island of Taiwan, where
it currently remains. Since then, the People's Republic
of China (PRC) has claimed sovereignty over Taiwan and
some nearby islands, which are administered by the ROC, and asserts
that the PRC has supplanted the ROC in its legitimacy to govern
all of China. The ROC rejects these claims, and administers itself
as a sovereign country with a democratically elected government
and president. Until 1991, the ROC also claimed to be the sole leader
of all of China, as well as Mongolia. The term "mainland China"
is sometimes used to denote the area under PRC rule, but usually
excludes the two Special Administrative Regions: Hong Kong and Macau.
The Communist Party of China (CPC) has led the PRC under a one-party
system since the country's establishment in 1949. Despite this,
nearly half of the PRC's economy has been privatized in the past
three decades under "Socialism with Chinese characteristics."
Market-based economic reforms started since 1978 helped lift millions
of people out of poverty, bringing the poverty rate down from 53%
of population in 1981 to 8% by 2001. Today, China is the world's
largest producer of steel and concrete, and consumes a third of
the world's steel, over half of the world's concrete, and is the
second largest importer and consumer of world oil.
However, due to this mixing of market and planned economies, the
PRC is faced with a number of problems associated with each, including
unemployment and an increasing rural/urban income gap. Despite these
shortcomings, greater prosperity has led to growing Chinese influence
in global, economic, political, military, scientific, technological,
and cultural affairs.
Geography and climate
China is composed of a vast variety of highly different landscapes,
with mostly plateaus and mountains in the west, and lower lands
in the east. Principal rivers flow from west to east, including
the Yangtze (central), the Huang He (Yellow river, north-central),
and the Amur (northeast), and sometimes toward the south (including
the Pearl River, Mekong River, and Brahmaputra), with most Chinese
rivers emptying into the Pacific Ocean.
In the east, along the shores of the Yellow Sea and the East China
Sea there are extensive and densely populated alluvial plains. On
the edges of the Inner Mongolian plateau in the north, grasslands
can be seen. Southern China is dominated by hills and low mountain
ranges. In the central-east are the deltas of China's two major
rivers, the Huang He and Yangtze River (Chang Jiang). Most of China's
arable lands lie along these rivers; they were the centers of China's
major ancient civilizations. Other major rivers include the Pearl
River, Mekong, Brahmaputra and Amur. Yunnan Province is considered
a part of the Greater Mekong Subregion, which also includes Myanmar,
Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam.
In the west, the north has a great alluvial plain, and the south
has a vast calcareous tableland traversed by hill ranges of moderate
elevation, and the Himalayas, containing Earth's highest point,
Mount Everest. The northwest also has high plateaus with more arid
desert landscapes such as the Takla-Makan and the Gobi Desert, which
has been expanding. During many dynasties, the southwestern border
of China has been the high mountains and deep valleys of Yunnan,
which separate modern China from Burma, Laos and Vietnam.
The Paleozoic formations of China, excepting only the upper part
of the Carboniferous system, are marine, while the Mesozoic and
Tertiary deposits are estuarine and freshwater or else of terrestrial
origin. Groups of volcanic cones occur in the Great Plain of north
China. In the Liaodong and Shandong Peninsulas, there are basaltic
plateaus.
The climate of China varies greatly. The northern zone (containing
Beijing) has summer daytime temperatures of more 30 degrees and
winters of Arctic severity. The central zone (containing Shanghai)
has a temperate continental climate with very hot summers and cold
winters. The southern zone (containing Guangzhou) has a subtropical
climate with very hot summers and mild winters.
Due to a prolonged drought and poor agricultural practices, dust
storms have become usual in the spring in China. Dust has blown
to southern China and Taiwan, and has even reached the West Coast
of the United States. Water, erosion, and pollution control have
become important issues in China's relations with other countries.
Info from http://en.wikipedia.org/
Chinese Embassies Worldwide - beginning with letters:
A
| B
| C
| D
| E
| F
| G
| H
| I
| J
| K
| L
| M
| N
| O
| P
| Q
| R
| S
| T
| U
| V
| W
| X
| Y
| Z
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