General Introduction

JLiaoning Province -- China's leading apple producer and home of Dalian, the nationally known fishery center -- in the southern part of northeast China is bounded by the Huanghai and Bohai seas in the south, with a coastline 2,187 kilometers long. It has a total area of more than 140,000 square kilometers, of which 60 per cent are mountains, 10 per cent rivers and 30 per cent farmland; and a population of 34.87 million, of which 31.8 per cent are in the cities and 68.2 per cent in the rural areas. Liaoning Province is also the home of Anshan, the "Steel Capital" of China.

Scenic Spots

Anshan -- Capital of Steel
Dalian -- Scenic Resort
Fushun -- City of Coal
Shenyang -- Center of Industry


Topography

With vast areas of flatland surrounded by mountains and seas, Liaoning is high in the west and east and low in the middle and the southern coastal areas. It consists of three topographical zones: l) The Eastern Liaoning Tableland is mostly less than 500 meters above sea level, with a few peaks exceeding 1,000 meters. The Liaodong Peninsula, which juts out between the Huanghai and Bohai seas from the land mass, has a zigzag coast and many rocky islands and fine natural harbors. 2) The Western Liaoning Tableland, an extension of the Inner Mongolia Plateau, descends from west to east like a staircase. The oblong coastal plain along the Bohai Sea has since ancient times been an important passage linking the regions north and south of the Great Wall. 3) The Liaohe Plain between the Eastern and Western Liaoning tablelands is part of the Northeast Plain. Formed of the alluvial of the Liaohe and its tributaries, it has a well-developed agriculture.

The Liaohe, the principal waterway of the province, flows through the middle part of Liaoning from north to south. The Yalu on the eastern fringe is the boundary river between China and Korea.

Climate

Liaoning has a temperate continental monsoonal climate, with a hot, rainy summer; a long, cold winter with little snow and a short, windy spring. It has a mean annual temperature of 6-11ºC, a frost-free period of 130-180 days, and a mean annual precipitation of 400-1,000 mm., which decreases notably from southeast to northwest Liaoning has the highest temperature and the greatest precipitation of any province in northeast China.


Communications

With its railway mileage exceeding 4,000 kilometers, Liaoning has the densest network of rail lines in the country. Radiating from Shenyang are trunk lines such as the Beijing-Harbin, Shenyang-Dalian, Shenyang-Jilin and Shenyang-Dandong railways. Its 36,000 kilometers of highways lead to all parts of the province. Its main ports include Dalian, Dandong and Yingkou.