Survey

Shanxi province is named after its geographical location in the middle west of China and to the west of the Taihang Mountains . It is called "San Jin" in short, meaning the province is composed of three parts. It has a territory of 156,300 km2 and its population was reported to be 31.722 million at the end of 1998.

The whole province is on the loess plateau with 4/5 of its land being hills and mountains. It has a continental and seasonally windy climate of the Temperate Zone , cold in winter and hot in summer. The province is pinched for water resources. Its total area of farmland is 56 million mu and its forest coverage rate is 20%. Shanxi is rich in the kinds and quantities of deposited minerals, which are further favored by their wide distribution. Up to now, 127 kinds of minerals have been discovered and 24 kinds of them have been ascertained to be ranked in the first ten in China .

Shanxi is also named a coal sea. The anticipated total coal reserves reach 871 billion tons, and the land with coal reserves under accounts for 39.6% of the province's total territory.

Shanxi is also in possession of human and tourism resources as its long history has left behind numerous ancient buildings, painted sculptures and murals a rich cultural heritage ranked the first in China, so the province is also named "the museum of the Chinese ancient culture". The well-protected ancient county seat of Pingyao is one of the world famous historic and cultural cities certified by the UN.

Shanxi is also one of the revolutionary base areas in China 's modern history. As early as in 1924, the Communist Party of China (CPC) had established its local organizations in Shanxi . During the War against the Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation, under the leadership of the CPC, the people of Shanxi made great contributions to the victory of the War against the Japanese Aggression and the liberation of the whole country.

On April 24, 1949 , the People's Liberation Army liberated Taiyuan , the province's capital and on October 1 the same year, the founding of the People's Republic of China was proclaimed. Thenceforward, under the leadership of the CPC, the people of Shanxi set foot in full confidence on their path to an all round construction of the province.

For 50 years, the people of Shanxi have materialized brilliant achievements along the socialist road with Chinese characteristics. The history of these 50 years can be divided into four periods.

From the founding of the republic to 1956 was the first period marking the restoration of the national economy and the basic completion of the socialist transformation. In this period, in the light of the related Party's policies, the provincial government led its people in the realization of a step by step transformation from a new democracy to socialism and in the establishment and perfection of a new democratic political and economic system, on the basis of which the national economy was restored and developed and the socialist transformation of the ownership of means of production basically completed and a socialist political system firmly established.

From 1957 to 1965 was a period during which socialist construction in Shanxi gained an initial development in a zigzag way. In 1957, the province fulfilled its first five-year plan in advance and began to step on a path to industrialization, taking coal mining, metallurgy, power generation, machine building and chemical production as its pillar industries. After 1958, a large batch of medium sized water conservancy installations were constructed and thrown one after another into service in the province; what was more, the emergence of commune-run enterprises laid a foundation for the development of agriculture. Up to 1965, the people all over the province had in the spirit of self reliance and hard struggle defeated the difficulties and natural disasters, which had kept visiting them in the past three years consecutively, and had restored the province's economy in a comparatively short period. In 1965, the province's gross output value of industry and agriculture reached 7.34 billion yuan, a 71.4% increase over that of 1957; the province's economy began to show a tendency of a coordinated development.

From the beginning of the Cultural Revolution in 1966 to its end in 1976 was a historical period during which various undertakings in the province were seriously interrupted and undermined.

Since the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976, especially during the 20 years up to the turn of the century since the third plenary session of the Party's 11th Congress, it has been a period of a new historical development for the people of the province on their way of building socialism with Chinese characteristics. For 20 years, under the leadership of the Party's provincial committee and the provincial government, the people of the province have held high the great banner of Deng Xiaoping's theory, centering around economic construction and sticking to the reform and opening and the four cardinal principles, and have in the spirit of hard struggle and self reliance deepened reform and furthered opening, and have basically formed an idea in keeping with the actual development of the province, and have made great progress in the province's construction of material civilization and spiritual civilization. In 1996, its GDP reached 130.55 billion yuan, 4.14 times that of 1980, realizing four years in advance the strategic objective of quadrupling its GDP. In 1998, the province's GDP increased further to 160.11 billion yuan.

The 30 million people on this old land with a glorious revolutionary tradition will continuously hold high the great banner of Deng Xiaoping's theory to forge ahead into the 21st century.