Politics of Denmark
The politics of Denmark take place within the framework of a parliamentary representative democracy, a constitutional monarchy and a decentralised unitary state in which the monarch of Denmark, Queen Margrethe II, is head of state. Denmark is described as a nation state. Danish politics and governance are characterized by a common striving for broad consensus on important issues, within both the political community and society as a whole. Executive power is exercised by the cabinet of Denmark, presided over by the Prime Minister, first among equals. Legislative power is vested in the national parliament. Members of the judiciary are nominated by the executive, formally appointed by the monarch and employed until retirement. Denmark has a multi-party system, with two strong parties, four or five other significant parties. No single party has held an absolute majority in the Folketing since the beginning of the 20th century. Since only four post-war coalition governments have enjoyed a majority, government bills become law without negotiations and compromise with both supporting and opposition parties.
Hence the Folketing tends to be more powerful than legislatures in other EU countries. The Constitution does not grant the judiciary power of judicial review of legislation, however the courts have asserted this power with the consent of the other branches of government. Since there are no constitutional or administrative courts, the Supreme Court deals with a constitutional dimension. On many issues the political parties tend to opt for co-operation, the Danish state welfare model receives broad parliamentary support; this ensures a focus on public-sector efficiency and devolved responsibilities of local government on regional and municipal levels. The degree of transparency and accountability is reflected in the public's high level of satisfaction with the political institutions, while Denmark is regularly considered one of the least corrupt countries in the world by international organizations; the Economist Intelligence Unit rated Denmark as "full democracy" in 2016. Margrethe II has ruled as Queen Regnant and head of state since 14 January 1972.
In accordance with the Danish Constitution the Danish monarch, as head of state, is the theoretical source of all executive and legislative power. However, since the introduction of parliamentary sovereignty in 1901, a de facto separation of powers has been in effect; the text of the Danish constitution dates back to 1849. Therefore, it has been interpreted by jurists to suit modern conditions. In a formal sense, the monarch retains the ability to deny giving a bill royal assent. In order for a bill to become law, a royal signature, a countersignature by a government minister, is required; the monarch chooses and dismisses the Prime Minister, although in modern times a dismissal would cause a constitutional crisis. On 28 March 1920, King Christian X was the last monarch to exercise the power of dismissal, sparking the 1920 Easter Crisis. All royal powers called Royal Prerogative, such as patronage to appoint ministers and the ability to declare war and make peace, are exercised by the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, with the formal consent of the Queen.
When a new government is to be formed, the monarch calls the party leaders to a conference of deliberation, where the latter advise the monarch. On the basis of the advice the monarch appoints the party leader who commands a majority of recommendation to lead negotiations for forming a new government. According to the principles of constitutional monarchy, today the monarch has an ceremonial role, restricted in his or her exercise of power by the convention of parliamentary democracy and the separation of powers. However, the monarch does continue to exercise three rights: the right to be consulted. Pursuant to these ideals, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet attend the regular meeting of the Council of State. Denmark has a multiparty system. Nine parties are represented in parliament; the four oldest and in history most influential parties are the Conservative People's Party, the Social Democrats and the Danish Social Liberal Party. However, demographics have been in favour of younger parties, which has led to a constant process of policy development and gradual renewal amongst the political parties.
No two parties have the same organization. It is however common for a party to have: an annual convention which approves manifestos and elects party chairmen. In most cases the party members in parliament form their own group with autonomy to develop and promote party politics in parliament and between elections; the government performs the executive functions of the kingdom. The affairs of government are decided by the Cabinet, headed by the Prime Minister; the Cabinet and the Prime Minister are responsible for their actions to the Folketing. Members of the Cabinet are given the title of "minister" and each hold a different portfolio of government duties; the day to day role of the cabinet members is to serve as head of one or more segments of the national bureaucracy, as head of the civil servants to which all employees in that department report. Enjoying the status of primus inter pares, the Prime Minister is head of the Danish government; the Prime Minister and members of the Cabinet are appointed by the Crown on basi
China
China the People's Republic of China, is a country in East Asia and the world's most populous country, with a population of around 1.404 billion. Covering 9,600,000 square kilometers, it is the third- or fourth-largest country by total area. Governed by the Communist Party of China, the state exercises jurisdiction over 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four direct-controlled municipalities, the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau. China emerged as one of the world's earliest civilizations, in the fertile basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, China's political system was based on hereditary monarchies, or dynasties, beginning with the semi-legendary Xia dynasty in 21st century BCE. Since China has expanded, re-unified numerous times. In the 3rd century BCE, the Qin established the first Chinese empire; the succeeding Han dynasty, which ruled from 206 BC until 220 AD, saw some of the most advanced technology at that time, including papermaking and the compass, along with agricultural and medical improvements.
The invention of gunpowder and movable type in the Tang dynasty and Northern Song completed the Four Great Inventions. Tang culture spread in Asia, as the new Silk Route brought traders to as far as Mesopotamia and Horn of Africa. Dynastic rule ended in 1912 with the Xinhai Revolution; the Chinese Civil War resulted in a division of territory in 1949, when the Communist Party of China established the People's Republic of China, a unitary one-party sovereign state on Mainland China, while the Kuomintang-led government retreated to the island of Taiwan. The political status of Taiwan remains disputed. Since the introduction of economic reforms in 1978, China's economy has been one of the world's fastest-growing with annual growth rates above 6 percent. According to the World Bank, China's GDP grew from $150 billion in 1978 to $12.24 trillion by 2017. Since 2010, China has been the world's second-largest economy by nominal GDP and since 2014, the largest economy in the world by purchasing power parity.
China is the world's largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a recognized nuclear weapons state and has the world's largest standing army and second-largest defense budget; the PRC is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as it replaced the ROC in 1971, as well as an active global partner of ASEAN Plus mechanism. China is a leading member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, WTO, APEC, BRICS, the BCIM, the G20. In recent times, scholars have argued that it will soon be a world superpower, rivaling the United States; the word "China" has been used in English since the 16th century. It is not a word used by the Chinese themselves, it has been traced through Portuguese and Persian back to the Sanskrit word Cīna, used in ancient India."China" appears in Richard Eden's 1555 translation of the 1516 journal of the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa. Barbosa's usage was derived from Persian Chīn, in turn derived from Sanskrit Cīna.
Cīna was first used including the Mahābhārata and the Laws of Manu. In 1655, Martino Martini suggested that the word China is derived from the name of the Qin dynasty. Although this derivation is still given in various sources, it is complicated by the fact that the Sanskrit word appears in pre-Qin literature; the word may have referred to a state such as Yelang. The meaning transferred to China as a whole; the origin of the Sanskrit word is still a matter of debate, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. The official name of the modern state is the "People's Republic of China"; the shorter form is "China" Zhōngguó, from zhōng and guó, a term which developed under the Western Zhou dynasty in reference to its royal demesne. It was applied to the area around Luoyi during the Eastern Zhou and to China's Central Plain before being used as an occasional synonym for the state under the Qing, it was used as a cultural concept to distinguish the Huaxia people from perceived "barbarians". The name Zhongguo is translated as "Middle Kingdom" in English.
Archaeological evidence suggests that early hominids inhabited China between 2.24 million and 250,000 years ago. The hominid fossils of Peking Man, a Homo erectus who used fire, were discovered in a cave at Zhoukoudian near Beijing; the fossilized teeth of Homo sapiens have been discovered in Fuyan Cave in Hunan. Chinese proto-writing existed in Jiahu around 7000 BCE, Damaidi around 6000 BCE, Dadiwan from 5800–5400 BCE, Banpo dating from the 5th millennium BCE; some scholars have suggested. According to Chinese tradition, the first dynasty was the Xia, which emerged around 2100 BCE; the dynasty was considered mythical by historians until scientific excavations found early Bronze Age sites at Erlitou, Henan in 1959. It remains unclear whether these sites are the remains of the Xia dynasty or of another culture from the same period; the succeeding Shang dynasty is the earliest to be confirmed by contemporary records. The Shang ruled the plain of the Yellow River in eastern China from the 17th to the 11th century BCE.
Their oracle bone script
Germany
Germany the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central and Western Europe, lying between the Baltic and North Seas to the north, the Alps to the south. It borders Denmark to the north and the Czech Republic to the east and Switzerland to the south, France to the southwest, Luxembourg and the Netherlands to the west. Germany includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,386 square kilometres, has a temperate seasonal climate. With 83 million inhabitants, it is the second most populous state of Europe after Russia, the most populous state lying in Europe, as well as the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is a decentralized country, its capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while Frankfurt serves as its financial capital and has the country's busiest airport. Germany's largest urban area is the Ruhr, with its main centres of Essen; the country's other major cities are Hamburg, Cologne, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf, Dresden, Bremen and Nuremberg. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity.
A region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period, the Germanic tribes expanded southward. Beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation. After the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire, the German Confederation was formed in 1815; the German revolutions of 1848–49 resulted in the Frankfurt Parliament establishing major democratic rights. In 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the revolution of 1918–19, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic; the Nazi seizure of power in 1933 led to the establishment of a dictatorship, the annexation of Austria, World War II, the Holocaust. After the end of World War II in Europe and a period of Allied occupation, Austria was re-established as an independent country and two new German states were founded: West Germany, formed from the American and French occupation zones, East Germany, formed from the Soviet occupation zone.
Following the Revolutions of 1989 that ended communist rule in Central and Eastern Europe, the country was reunified on 3 October 1990. Today, the sovereign state of Germany is a federal parliamentary republic led by a chancellor, it is a great power with a strong economy. As a global leader in several industrial and technological sectors, it is both the world's third-largest exporter and importer of goods; as a developed country with a high standard of living, it upholds a social security and universal health care system, environmental protection, a tuition-free university education. The Federal Republic of Germany was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1957 and the European Union in 1993, it is part of the Schengen Area and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999. Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G7, the G20, the OECD. Known for its rich cultural history, Germany has been continuously the home of influential and successful artists, musicians, film people, entrepreneurs, scientists and inventors.
Germany has a large number of World Heritage sites and is among the top tourism destinations in the world. The English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine; the German term Deutschland diutisciu land is derived from deutsch, descended from Old High German diutisc "popular" used to distinguish the language of the common people from Latin and its Romance descendants. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz "popular", derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- "people", from which the word Teutons originates; the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a coal mine in Schöningen between 1994 and 1998 where eight 380,000-year-old wooden javelins of 1.82 to 2.25 m length were unearthed. The Neander Valley was the location where the first non-modern human fossil was discovered.
The Neanderthal 1 fossils are known to be 40,000 years old. Evidence of modern humans dated, has been found in caves in the Swabian Jura near Ulm; the finds included 42,000-year-old bird bone and mammoth ivory flutes which are the oldest musical instruments found, the 40,000-year-old Ice Age Lion Man, the oldest uncontested figurative art discovered, the 35,000-year-old Venus of Hohle Fels, the oldest uncontested human figurative art discovered. The Nebra sky disk is a bronze artefact created during the European Bronze Age attributed to a site near Nebra, Saxony-Anhalt, it is part of UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme. The Germanic tribes are thought to date from the Pre-Roman Iron Age. From southern Scandinavia and north Germany, they expanded south and west from the 1st century BC, coming into contact with the Celtic tribes of Gaul as well
North Schleswig Germans
15,000 people in Denmark belong to an autochthonous ethnic German minority traditionally referred to as hjemmetyskere meaning "domestic Germans" in Danish, as Nordschleswiger in German. This minority of Germans hold Danish self-identify as ethnic Germans, they speak German or Low German alongside South Jutlandic dialect of Danish as their home languages. Furthermore, there are several thousand German immigrants residing in Denmark with no historical connection to this group. In 1920, in the aftermath of World War I, two Schleswig Plebiscites were held in the northernmost part of the Prussian Province of Schleswig-Holstein; the plebiscites were held in two zones that were defined by Denmark according to the ideas of the Danish historian Hans Victor Clausen. The northern Zone I was deliminated according to Clausen's estimation of where the local rural population identified itself as Danish, a survey published in 1891. Clausen travelled extensively on both sides of the eventual border, in an attempt determine which communities that would vote for a return to Danish rule, concluded that this was the case north of the Skelbækken creek, where most rural communities were both Danish-speaking and pro-Danish, while the communities south of this line were overwhelmingly pro-German.
Near Tønder, he deviated from this system, included the German-majority towns of Tønder and Højer into the northern sector for economic purposes, to achieve a line following a dyke this line followed the dyke south of Højer. The northern Zone I voted en bloc, i.e. as a unit with the majority deciding, the result was 75% for Denmark and 25% for Germany resulting in a German minority north on the new border. In the southern Zone II, each parish/town voted for its own future allegiance, all districts in Zone II showed German majorities; the eventual border was deliminated identical with the border between Zones I and II. In the northern Zone, 25% of the population, i.e. around 40,000 people voted to remain part of Germany, the German North Schleswigers having their centres in the towns of Tønder, Sønderborg, but in a rural district between Tønder and Flensburg near the new border, most notably in Tinglev. Smaller German minorities existed in Christiansfeld. Sønderborg and Aabenraa were dominated by both nationalities.
In Sønderborg, the German majority was due to a local military garrison, the German element in this town decreased in the 1920s, after the German garrison had been withdrawn and replaced with a Danish one. Tønder had a vast German majority but was included in the northern Zone for geographical and economic reasons, because of the small population of this North Schleswig towns. Between 1920–1939, the North Schleswig Germans elected Johannes Schmidt-Vodder as their representative in the Danish Parliament with c. 13–15% of the North Schleswig votes, indicating that the share of North Schleswigers that identified as Germans had decreased when compared with the 1920 referendum. Since 1945, the North Schleswig Germans have been presented by Bund Deutscher Nordschleswiger, a cultural organisation, continued to elect a member of Parliament until the 1950s; the North Schleswig Germans are represented in the municipal councils of Aabenraa, Tønder, Sønderborg. Bund Deutscher Nordschleswiger estimates the current number of North Schleswig Germans to be around 15,000, i.e. around 6% of the North Schleswig population of c.
250,000. Which are a lot fewer than the 50,000 Danish who lives in Southern Schleswig, where for instance Flensborg Avis, a newspaper in Danish is printed every day. Potato Germans Danish minority of Southern Schleswig German-Danish agreement on minority rights, 1955
Venstre (Denmark)
Venstre, full name Venstre, Danmarks Liberale Parti, is a conservative-liberal, agrarian political party in Denmark. Founded as part of a peasants' movement against the landed aristocracy, today it espouses an economically liberal pro-free market ideology. Venstre is the major party of the centre-right in Denmark, the third largest party in the country; the party has produced many Prime Ministers. Denmark's current government is a minority government consisting of Venstre, the Liberal Alliance, the Conservative People's Party, with external support from the Danish People's Party. In the 2015 parliamentary elections, Venstre received 19.5% of the vote, 34 out of 179 seats. It is led by Lars Løkke Rasmussen, who took over as party leader and Prime Minister from Anders Fogh Rasmussen when the latter became Secretary General of NATO in 2009; the party is a member of Liberal International and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe. One of Denmark's thirteen MEPs are from Venstre in the 2014-19 term of office, they sit with the ALDE Group in the European Parliament.
Venstre is categorised as centre-right on the political spectrum. It is a market liberal party within the Nordic agrarian tradition, today is notably more pro-free market than its sister parties; some describe it as classical liberal, since its leader from 1998 to 2009, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, is known for his authorship of the book From Social State to Minimal State. His book advocated an extensive reform of the Danish welfare state along classical liberal lines, including lower taxes and less government interference in corporate and individual matters. Since the elections in 2001, Venstre has enacted a so-called "tax stop" in order to halt the growth in taxes seen during the previous eight years under the Social Democrats; this tax stop has been under heavy fire from the parties on the left wing of Danish politics for being "asocial" and "only for the rich." Venstre, or "the Left" in English, was founded in 1870 under the name Det Forenede Venstre. It was formed through the merger of three parliamentary factions, all of whom had identified as leftist in the context of the time.
From 1895 to 1910 it was known as Venstrereformpartiet, after that as Venstre. Venstre was traditionally a party advocating free trade and farmers' interests as opposed to the interests of the aristocracy which were the platform of the conservative party, Højre; this traditional landed basis resulted in a relative decline in influence due to the accelerating urbanisation of Danish society. Starting in the 1880s, the party began expanding into urban regions as well. By the 1910s, the splitting off of the Social Liberals and the appearance of the Social Democrats had pushed Venstre toward the centre, it relied on its former conservative adversaries for parliamentary support. After the 1960s these developments reoriented Venstre from a classical liberal party to conservative liberalism. During the leadership of Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the party turned further to the right. 1901–1909 1910–1913 1920–1924 1926–1929 1945–1947 1950–53 with the Conservative People's Party 1968–71 with the Conservative People's Party and the Danish Social Liberal Party 1973–75 1978–79 with the Social Democratic Party 1982–88 with the Conservative People's Party, Centre Democrats, the Christian People's Party 1988–90 with the Conservative People's Party and Social Liberal Party 1990–93 with the Conservative People's Party 2001–11 with the Conservative People's Party 2015–16 2016– with the Liberal Alliance and the Conservative People's Party Johan Henrik Deuntzer Jens Christian Christensen Niels Neergaard Ludvig Holstein-Ledreborg Klaus Berntsen Niels Neergaard Thomas Madsen-Mygdal Knud Kristensen Erik Eriksen Poul Hartling Anders Fogh Rasmussen Lars Løkke Rasmussen The fact that the major centre-right political party in a country calls itself'Left' is confusing to foreign observers.
The name has, its historical explanation. At the time of its foundation, Venstre affirmed then-progressive ideas in the Danish parliament, their opponents, Højre, the forerunner of the present-day Conservative People's Party, advocated for established interests the Church of Denmark and the landed gentry. In current Danish politics there is a clear distinction between the concepts of Venstre and venstrefløj; the use of the word for "left" in the name of the Danish political party Radikale Venstre and the Norwegian party Venstre is meant to refer to liberalism and not socialism. Members of the party are referred to as venstremænd and venstrekvinder "Venstre men" and "Venstre women". Venstres Ungdom Liberal Students of Denmark Liberalism Contributions to liberal theory Liberalism worldwide List of liberal parties Liberal democracy Liberalism and radicalism in Denmark Nordic agrarian parties Tom Matz, Venstre ved du hvor du har. ForlagsKompagniet: Nørhaven Book. Venstre official site Denmark's Li
Municipality
A municipality is a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. It is to be distinguished from the county, which may encompass rural territory or numerous small communities such as towns and hamlets; the term municipality may mean the governing or ruling body of a given municipality. A municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district; the term is derived from French Latin municipalis. The English word municipality derives from the Latin social contract municipium, referring to the Latin communities that supplied Rome with troops in exchange for their own incorporation into the Roman state while permitting the communities to retain their own local governments. A municipality can be any political jurisdiction from a sovereign state, such as the Principality of Monaco, to a small village, such as West Hampton Dunes, New York.
The territory over which a municipality has jurisdiction may encompass only one populated place such as a city, town, or village several of such places only parts of such places, sometimes boroughs of a city such as the 34 municipalities of Santiago, Chile. Powers of municipalities range from virtual autonomy to complete subordination to the state. Municipalities may have the right to tax individuals and corporations with income tax, property tax, corporate income tax, but may receive substantial funding from the state. In various countries, municipalities are referred to as "communes", notably in Romance languages such as French commune, Italian comune, Romanian comună, Spanish comuna, in Germanic languages such as German Kommune, Swedish kommun, Faroese kommuna, Norwegian, Danish kommune. However, in Moldova and Romania exist both municipalities and communes, a commune may be part of a municipality. Similar terms include Spanish ayuntamiento called municipalidad, Polish gmina, Dutch/Flemish Gemeente and Luxembourgish Gemeng.
In Australia, the term local government area is used in place of the generic municipality. Here, the "LGA Structure covers only incorporated areas of Australia. Incorporated areas are designated parts of states and territories over which incorporated local governing bodies have responsibility." In Canada, municipalities are local governments established through provincial and territorial legislation within general municipal statutes. Types of municipalities within Canada include cities, district municipalities, municipal districts, parishes, rural municipalities, townships and villes among others; the Province of Ontario has different tiers of municipalities, including lower and single tiers. Types of upper tier municipalities in Ontario include regional municipalities. Nova Scotia has regional municipalities, which include cities, districts, or towns as municipal units. In India, a Municipality or Nagar Palika is an urban local body that administers a city of population 100,000 or more. However, there are exceptions to that, as Municipality were constituted in urban centers with population over 20,000, so all the urban bodies which were classified as Municipality were reclassified as Municipality if their population was under 100,000.
Under the Panchayati Raj system, it interacts directly with the state government, though it is administratively part of the district it is located in. Smaller district cities and bigger towns have a Municipality. Municipality are a form of local self-government entrusted with some duties and responsibilities, as enshrined in the Constitutional Act,1992. In the United Kingdom, the term was used until the 1972 Local Government Act came into effect in 1974 in England and Wales, until 1975 in Scotland and 1976 in Northern Ireland, "both for a city or town, organized for self-government under a municipal corporation, for the governing body itself; such a corporation in Great Britain consists of a head as a mayor or provost, of superior members, as aldermen and councillors". Since local government reorganisation, the unit in England, Northern Ireland and Wales is known as a district, in Scotland as a council area. A district can retain its district title. In Jersey, a municipality refers to the honorary officials elected to run each of the 12 parishes into which it is subdivided.
This is the highest level of regional government in this jurisdiction. In Trinidad and Tobago, "municipality" is understood as a city, town, or other local government unit, formed by municipal charter from the state as a municipal corporation. A town may be awarded borough status and on may be upgraded to city status. Chaguanas, San Fernando, Port of Spain and Point Fortin are the 5 current municipalities in Trinidad and Tobago. In the United States, "municipality" is understood as a city, village, or other local government unit, formed by municipal charter from the state as a municipal corporation. In a state law contex
Baoding
Baoding is a prefecture-level city in central Hebei province 150 kilometres southwest of Beijing. At the 2010 census, Baoding City had 11,194,372 inhabitants out of which 2,176,857 lived in the built-up area made of 3 urban districts and Qingyuan and Mancheng counties being conurbated, on 1,840 km2. Baoding is among 13 Chinese cities with a population of over 10 million, ranking seventh. Baoding is a city with a history dating back to the Western Han Dynasty, it was destroyed by the Mongols in the 13th century, but after the Mongols established the Yuan Dynasty, it was rebuilt. It acquired the name "Baoding" during the Yuan dynasty — the name is interpreted as "protecting the capital", referring to the city's proximity to Beijing. Baoding served for many years as the capital of Zhili, was a significant centre of culture in the Ming Dynasty and early Qing Dynasty. During the Boxer rebellion, Boxer rebels killed a Turk, two Swiss, an Italian in Baoding. In August 1, 1949, the people's Government of Hebei province was established, Baoding was the capital of the province, the city of Baoding was a provincial municipality.
In August 9, the administrative inspector's office of the Baoding district was established, it was established as the administrative inspector's office of the county district. In May 1958, the capital of Hebei was moved to Tianjin. In January 1966, the provincial capital was moved from Tianjin to Baoding. In February 1968, the provincial capital moved to Shijiazhuang. In December 1994, the Baoding area merged with Baoding to become a provincial city. In April 2017, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, the State Council issued a notice, decided to establish the Hebei Xiong a new area, another new area of national significance following the Shenzhen special economic zone and Shanghai Pudong New Area. Baoding is located in the west-central portion of Hebei province and lies on the North China Plain, with the Taihang Mountains to the west. Bordering prefecture-level cities in the province are Zhangjiakou to the north and Cangzhou to the east, Shijiazhuang and Hengshui to the south.
Baoding borders Beijing to the northeast and Shanxi to the west. Elevations in Baoding's administrative area decrease from northwest to southeast; the western parts are dominated by mountains and hills that are more than 1,000 metres tall. The highest peak is Mount Waitou, with an elevation of 2,286 metres. Moving southeast from this area, one encounters low-lying mountains and hills, taking up 18.9% of the prefecture's area. Further to the east lies flat terrain of 30 to 100 metres elevation. Here the primary rivers are the Juma, Cao, Longquan and Sha Rivers. Baiyangdian Lake, the largest natural lake in northern China, can be found nearby. Baoding has a continental, monsoon-influenced humid continental climate, characterised by hot, humid summers due to the East Asian monsoon, cold, windy dry winters that reflect the influence of the vast Siberian anticyclone. Spring can bear witness to sandstorms blowing in from the Mongolian steppe, accompanied by warming, but dry, conditions. Autumn is similar to spring in lack of rainfall.
The annual rainfall, about 60% of which falls in July and August alone, is variable and not reliable. In the city itself, this amount has averaged to a meagre 513 millimetres per annum; the monthly 24-hour average temperature ranges from −3.2 °C in January to 26.8 °C in July, the annual mean is 12.9 °C. There are 2,500 to 2,900 hours of bright sunshine annually, the frost-free period lasts 165−210 days. Baoding prefecture-level city consists of 5 municipal districts, 4 county-level cities, 15 counties: Dissolved districts: Beishi District and Nanshi District According to the 2010 Census, the residence population stood at 11,194,379, an increase of 605,100 from 2000; the male-female ratio was 101.94:100. Children aged up to 14 numbered 1,915,800, citizens 15 to 64 numbered 8,370,600, 65+ numbered 908,000; the urban area of Baoding has a population of around 1,006,000. The overwhelming majority of the population is Han Chinese; the language of Baoding is Mandarin Chinese — the Baoding dialect of Ji-Lu Mandarin.
Despite Baoding's proximity to Beijing, the Chinese spoken in Baoding is not close to the Beijing dialect — rather, it is more related to Tianjin dialect. Baoding is located in the centre of the Bohai Rim economic area which includes Beijing and Shijiazhuang. One of the largest employers in Baoding is China Lucky Film, the largest photosensitive materials and magnetic recording media manufacturer in China. And, Yingli group, 2010 World Cup sponsor, has its headquarters in Baoding, the Global Top 10 solar panel manufacturer. More renowned companies include ZhongHang HuiTeng Windpower Equipment Co. Ltd, Baoding Tianwei Group Co. Ltd and Great Wall Motor. In April 2017, an area in Baoding was designated as a Xiong'an New Area, a development zone of 100 km2 and up to 2000 km2, the site of what will be a new city and the hub of the Beijing-Tinajin-Hebei development area. Baoding High-tech Industrial Development Zone Baoding city has one of China's biggest plants which manufacture blades used in wind turbine generators, catering to the domestic market.
Tianwei Wind
