Qinhai province
| Qinghai is Located in the Northeastern part of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in Western China,. Its name comes from ¡°Qinghai Lake¡±, the largest inland salt-water lake in China. Qinghai is also famed as the ¡°Source of Rivers¡± as the Yangtze River, the Yellow River and the Mekong River rise in the province. With a length from east to west of 1200 km and a width from north to south of 800 km, the province has a total area of 720,000 square kilometers with 38.6 million ha. of grasslands, 590,000 ha. of cultivated land and 270,000 ha. of forestland, while the remaining area being high mountains, lakes, desert, Gobi and glacier. Bounded by Tibet, Xinjiang, Gansu and Sichuan provinces, Qinghai has an average attitude of more than 3,000 meters above sea level with 54 per cent of the total area being between 4,000 m and 5,000 m. Topographically, the province consists of Qilian Mountains, Qaidam Basin and South Highland. Riyue Mountain to the east of Qinghai Lake marks the natural watershed of the province, the Huangshui Drainage Area to the east of which belongs to agricultural area making up 4 per cent of the total area, while 96 percent to the west and south features in animal husbandry. The climate in the province is of typical highland and continent with main characteristics of dry, less rain, windy, cold and lack of oxygen. Annual average temperature is between ¨C3.7¡ª6¡ãC. Qinghai is a multi-ethnic province with 98 per cent of the total area being national minority autonomous region. The local ethnic groups are Hans, Tibetans, Huis, Tus, Salars, and Mongolians. Most of the Tibetans, the Tus and the Mongolians have their faith in Tibetan Buddhism (Lamaism), while the Huis and the Salars believe in Islam. Qinghai is a beautiful province with lots of famous historic relics. Its nature landscape is magnificent with unique features of Qinghai-Tibet Highland. The local ethnic groups have resided on this land for a long history, thus formed their own traditional customs and folkways which are of special attraction to tourists. The province is divided into three tourism areas, namely, east area, middle area and west area. Tourism facilities have been greatly improved to meet the requirements of the tourists from domestic and abroad. Famous scenic spots are Qinghai Lake, Ta¡¯er Monastery, Qutan Temple etc. At present, the annual increasing speed of GNP and local financial income must be over 10 per cent, the province is capable of turning out over 10,000 specifications of industrial products in 1,000 categories. Outputs of quality products increases at large margin, including electrolytic aluminum, electrolytic magnesium, lead-zinc, high quality steel and rolled steel, iron alloy, silicon-carbide, potash fertilizer, crude salt and asbestos. Many are leading products in earning foreign exchanges for Qinghai province because they are more competitive at domestic and international markets. a number of the state major projects related to hydroelectricity, petroleum, salt, chemical industry, and non-ferrous metals, has gone into operation. Inevitably, these projects will bring over more vitality to economic growth in Qinghai . |
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