China has 33 administrative units directly under the central government; these consist of 22 provinces, 5

autonomous regions, 4 municipalities (Chongqing, Beijing, Shanghai, and Tianjin), and 2 special
administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau). The island province of Taiwan, which has been under
separate administration since 1949, is discussed in the article Taiwan. Beijing (Peking), the capital of the
People’s Republic, is also the cultural, economic, and communications centre of the country. Shanghai is
the main industrial city; Hong Kong is the leading commercial centre and port.

Within China’s boundaries exists a highly diverse and complex country. Its topography encompasses the
highest and one of the lowest places on Earth, and its relief varies from nearly impenetrable mountainous
terrain to vast coastal lowlands. Its climate ranges from extremely dry, desertlike conditions in the
northwest to tropical monsoon in the southeast, and China has the greatest contrast in temperature
between its northern and southern borders of any country in the world.

The diversity of both China’s relief and its climate has resulted in one of the world’s widest arrays of
ecological niches, and these niches have been filled by a vast number of plant and animal species. Indeed,
practically all types of Northern Hemisphere plants, except those of the polar tundra, are found in China,
and, despite the continuous inroads of humans over the millennia, China still is home to some of the
world’s most exotic animals.

Probably the single most identifiable characteristic of China to the people of the rest of the world is the
size of its population. Some one-fifth of humanity is of Chinese nationality. The great majority of the
population is Chinese (Han), and thus China is often characterized as an ethnically homogeneous country,
but few countries have as wide a variety of indigenous peoples as does China. Even among the Han there
are cultural and linguistic differences between regions; for example, the only point of linguistic
commonality between two individuals from different parts of China may be the written Chinese
language. Because China’s population is so enormous, the population density of the country is also often
thought to be uniformly high, but vast areas of China are either uninhabited or sparsely populated.