The People’s Republic of China is currently the second largest economy in the world, the third largest country in the world by area (9,597,000 km²) and the largest national population (more than 1.3 billion inhabitants).
This country, of rich, ancient and brilliant civilization, for more than a century, was dominated by foreign powers, especially European ones, until 1949, when it became a socialist.
The country is marked by countless contrasts, such as the great disparity between the industrialized eastern part, in rapid development, and the agricultural, poor and rural western part.
Physical aspects of China
Relief
According to Homeagerly.com, China has the third largest territory in the world (9.6 million km²), surpassed only by the territories of Russia and Canada. The country shows a great physiographic contrast between the western and eastern portions.
In relation to the relief (geological structure), the Chinese territory presents, in the western portion, the plateaus, with great emphasis on the Plateau of Tibet , considered the “roof of the world”, due to the average altitudes that exceed 4 thousand meters.
In the southwestern portion, bordering India, Nepal and Bhutan, countries of South Asia, there is an imposing Himalayan Mountain Range – Tertiary Period chain formed by the convergence of the Indo-Australian and Eurasian plates, resulting from a modern folding, an area with intense quakes seismic because it is an orogenic process.
In the Himalayas, there is Mount Everest, the highest point on the planet with 8 848 meters of altitude, located on the border between China (annexed territory of Tibet) and Nepal.
Hydrography
In the eastern portion, extensive alluvial plains are located, with fertile soils and bathed by exoreic and perennial rivers, such as the Huang-ho (Yellow River) and Yang-tse-Kiang (Rio Azul), whose springs are located in the Planalto do Tibet.
Along these floodplains with high fertility, in which the Yellow River stands out, which presents loess soil (type of yellowish soil deposit that was transported by the wind), there is a large population concentration, with intense agricultural development.
In view of the successive water crises experienced by the population in the north, the Chinese government implemented the mega project to transpose the waters from the south to the north , aiming to supply the capital region Beijing, through three south-north channels. The largest transposition project was named Water Transposition from South to North. On December 27, 2014, the waters of the Yang-tse-Kiang River reached Beijing, after covering 1,200 km in 15 days, at the culmination of the first part of the transposition work.
In the west, there are endoreic rivers, which end up disappearing because of the desert or flowing into lakes, in the interior of the territory. The Central Asia Basin is the largest endoreic basin in the world.
Climate and vegetation
Located almost entirely in the Northern Temperate Climate Zone, the great Chinese territory has great climatic and landscape diversity, being influenced by latitude, relief, continentality and monsoons.
In it, there is an arid and semi- arid climate , with vegetation of xerófilas and steppes; mountain cold , with mountain vegetation (altitude), in the area of Tibet; temperate and subtropical , with temperate and subtropical forest vegetation and presence of deciduous and subcaducifolias; tropical monsoon , rainy summer and dry winter, with tropical forest vegetation. Bamboo vegetation is present in the east-southeast of the territory.
Human aspects of China
The Chinese population, currently the largest in the world, is made up of 56 ethnic groups, of which the Han group is the majority, representing 92% of the national population. The rest of the population is made up of groups such as Zhuang, Manchu, Hui, Miao, Uyghur, Tujia, Yi, Mongolian, Tibetan, Buyi, Dong, Yao and Korean.
After the 1949 Revolution, the Chinese population started to show strong population growth due to the high vegetative growth (high birth and fertility rates). Rapid population growth has become a state concern and the central government of China has implemented a strict birth control project: the one -child policy .
The population is heterogeneously distributed throughout the territory, that is, unevenly, with sparsely populated regions in the west, with desert plateaus and mountains, in contrast to large densely populated areas, often considered as human anthills, in the eastern portion, which it is favored by climates and river plains.
In Tibet, Sinkiang and Mongolia, in the continental interior, the densities are close to 15 inhab./km²; in monastic China (east), the density exceeds 400 inhab./km².
In the region of the eastern plains (east), where relief and climate favor human occupation, there are more than 80% of the national population, with a strong predominance of the Han ethnic group. Recently, the government has been trying, through the creation of mining projects and irrigated agriculture, to intensify the population of the western regions.
