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Geographic location
An inland province along the middle reaches of the Yellow River and a gateway to northwest China, Shaanxi links the west with the east and connects the north with the south. The Eurasia Continental Bridge, an international economic link starting from Lianyungang in the east and ending in Rotterdam, Netherlands, traverses through the province. It borders Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Henan, Hubei, Sichuan and Gansu, covering an area of 205,600 sq km. |
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General Economy
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Gross domestic product (GDP)
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GDP for 2005 was 367.475 billion yuan, up 12.6% from the previous year. The per capita GDP stood at 9,844 yuan, up 12.2%.
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GDP ratio (primary, secondary and tertiary industries)
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The primary industry yielded a value added of 41.86 billion yuan, 7.9% more than that of the previous year; the secondary industry, 184.897 billion yuan, a growth of 15.9%; the tertiary industry, 140.718 billion yuan, a growth of 10%. The GDP ratio of the three sectors was 11.4 : 50.3 : 38.3.
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Revenue and expenditure
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Provincial revenue was 52.86 billion yuan, an increase of 27.2% over the previous year. Provincial expenditure was 64.11 billion yuan, a growth of 24.2%.
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Consumer price index (CPI)
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CPI was up 1.2% from the previous year.
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Investment in fixed assets
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Fixed asset investment was valued at 198.052 billion yuan, up 28.3% from the previous year.
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Major Industries
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Agriculture
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The total agricultural output value was 73.07 billion yuan, up 8.1% from the previous year. The grain output was down by 1.8% from the previous year to reach 11.395 million tons.
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Industry
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The industrial added value totaled 126.718 billion yuan, an increase of 18.7%.
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Construction
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Its total output value was 59.444 billion yuan, up 13.2%.
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Transportation
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Freight carried by various means of transport for the year was 9.6% up from the previous year to reach 172.368 billion ton-kilometers, which included 145.983 billion ton-kilometers by railway, up 9.9%; 25.446 billion ton-kilometers by highway, up 7.5%; 904 million ton-kilometers by airway, up 27.3%.
The number of passengers carried by various means of transport was 8.3% up to reach 377 million, which included 37.37 million by railway, up 11.1%; 336 million by highway, up 8.1%; 3.44 million by waterway, down 3.4%; and 3.895 million by airway, up 20.1%.
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Postal services
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The annual turnover of postal operations totaled 1.643 billion yuan, 12.8% up from the previous year.
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Telecommunications
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The annual turnover of telecom services was 33.312 billion yuan, up 42%. By the end of 2005, the number of fixed line subscribers had reached 8.593 million, an increase of 8.5% from the 2004 figure, and the number of mobile phone subscribers had reached 9.381 million, an increase of 18.9%.
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Retail
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The annual turnover from retail sales reached 132.241 billion yuan, an increase of 13.7% from the previous year.
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Tourism
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Foreign exchange earnings from tourism totaled US$446 million, up 23.9%. Revenue from domestic tourists totaled 31.63 billion yuan, up 16.9%.
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Continued Effects of Market Reform
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Imports & exports
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The annual value of imports and exports totaled US$4.577 billion, an increase of 25.7% from the previous year. This included US$3.076 billion from exports, up 28.3%, and US$1.501 billion from imports, up 20.5%.
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Economic and technological cooperation
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Business turnover from overseas project and labor contracts for the year totaled US$242 million, an increase of 90.3% from the previous year.
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Foreign investment
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In 2005, the province approved a total of 256 foreign direct investment projects, down by 5.5% compared to the 2004 figure. The investment realized in monetary terms was US$628 billion, an increase of 19.3%.
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Social Undertakings
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Science and technology
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A total of 3,392 technological contracts were signed during the year, with the business turnover standing at 1.89 billion yuan.
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Education
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There were 72 institutions of higher learning at the year-end. The number of students enrolled in postgraduate schools and institutions of higher learning during the year stood at 20,700 and 208,900 respectively.
By the end of 2005, 97% of the school-age children in the province had had access to nine years of compulsory education.
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Culture
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The province had a total of 118 professional performing organizations, 111 cultural centers, 88 museums and 111 public libraries. All the 119 archives across the province are open to the public. About 93.21% and 94.36% of the provincial population respectively had access to various radio and TV programs.
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Public health
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There were a total of 5,366 medical and healthcare institutions (excluding privately-run clinics) equipped with 106,700 beds and staffed with some 165,300 medical professionals and technicians at the year-end. About 85.11% of the villages had set up medical or healthcare institutions. By the end of 2005, 11 counties had been involved in piloting the new-type cooperative medical insurance, covering a rural population of 2.316 million.
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Sports
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The year 2005 saw the organization of 350 sports games and activities, the number of participants topping 700,000. Yangling Teenager Outdoor Activity Camp was put into operation in May 2005. The annual sales of sports lottery stood at 620 million yuan, up 114% from 2004.
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Welfare and aid
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Various welfare units across the province at the end of 2005 were equipped with 16,000 beds and put up 12,000 homeless and vagrant people during the year. There were 7,379 urban community service facilities at the end of the year. A total of 790,000 urban residents and 976,000 rural residents had been covered by the minimum living guarantee system. In addition, about 131,000 rural patients got financial assistance from the rural medical aid system.
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Population, Employment, Social Security and Living Standards
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Population
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The year 2005 saw births of 372,000, or a birth rate of 10.02‰, and deaths of 223,000, or a mortality rate of 6.01‰. The natural growth rate of the population stood at 4.01‰. At the end of the year, the total population stood at 37.20 million.
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Employment
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The employed urban population stood at 3.342 million at the end of 2005, an increase of 0.79% than the 2004 figure. About 113,000 laid-off workers got re-employed during the year.
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Registered unemployment rate
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The registered urban unemployment rate was 4.18%.
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Social security
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In 2005, insurance plans for unemployment, endowments, medical treatment and occupational injuries covered a population of 3.266 million, 3.76 million, 3.488 million and 1.45 million respectively.
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Residents' income
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The disposable income of urban residents was 8,272 yuan per capita, up 9.4% from 2004. Rural residents' per capita net income was 2,052 yuan, a growth of 6.9% from the previous year.
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Residents' consumption
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Urban residents' per capita expenditure was 6,656 yuan, up 5.8% from the previous year, while rural residents' per capita expenditure was 1,896 yuan, up 14.5%.
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Geography and Natural Conditions
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Elevation extremes
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The province has three distinctive landforms from north to south. The Loess Plateau in the north has an elevation of 800-1,300 meters, and accounts for 45% of the total area of the province. The Central Shaanxi Plain in the middle averages an elevation of 520 meters. The Qinling and Daba mountainous areas in the south include the Qinling Mountains, Daba Mountains, and Hanjiang River Valley, accounting for 36% of the total area of the province. The Qinling Mountains measures 1,000-3,000 meters in elevation and the Daba Mountains in the southernmost of the province, 1,500-2,000 meters.
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Natural resources
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Minerals:
So far, 91 kinds of minerals have been found in the province, 58 of which have deposits ranking among the top ten in China. The reserves and output of gold rank fifth and fourth respectively. The output of molybdenum amounts to half of the country's total. The proved deposits of coal, the most abundant mineral in the province, come to 161.8 billion tons. The Shenmu-Fugu Coalfield in northern Shaanxi has reserves of 134 billion tons. It is one of the best fields in the world because of its thick coal layer and easy access and exploitation. In addition, northern Shaanxi has a gas field with proved reserves of 350 billion cubic meters.
Hydropower:
North of the Qinling Mountains is the Yellow River system, composed of the Weihe, Jinghe, Luohe, and Wuding rivers. South of the mountains is the Yangtze River system consisting of the Hanjiang, Danjiang, and Jialing rivers. The Hanjiang River, the largest river in the province, provides more than half of the province's total water runoff. Shaanxi has an annual water runoff of 42.6 billion cubic meters, which has a power-generation potential of 14 million kw.
Animals:
Shaanxi has more than 750 species of wild vertebrates, 79 of them rare. It is home to 12 species of animals and birds under state protection including the giant panda, snub-nosed monkey, and clouded leopard.
Plants:
The province has 5.93 million ha of forest in the Qinling, Daba, Guanshan, Huanglong, and Qiaoshan mountainous areas. It has a 28.8% rate of forest coverage. It has 3,300-plus species of wild plants, 37 of them rare. The province has 800 species of medicinal plants of great economic value including sea-buckthorn and gynostemma pentaphylla. It leads the country in the output and quality of raw lacquer. The traditional exports of the province are dates, walnut meat, and tung oil.
By 2005, the number of nature reserves in the province had reached 45, covering a total area of 995,000 hectares.
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Tourism resources
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Dispersed in Shaanxi are 72 imperial mausoleums, witness to the ancient economy and culture. The province is best known for ten scenic spots including the Mausoleum of Huang Di, the Qin terra-cotta warriors and horses, the Xi'an Forest of Stone Tablets, the Shaanxi Museum of History, and the city gate and wall of Xi'an. The Qin terra-cotta warriors and horses are often called the Eighth Wonder of the World and have been included by UNESCO in the list of World Cultural Heritages.
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