Wuhu City

Wuhu is located in southeast Anhui, the central geographic coordinate is 119°21' E. Longitude, 31°20' N. Latitude. With an area of 3,317 km² and a population of 2.15 million, including 0.63 million urban residents. The city has jurisdiction over 3 counties -- Wuhu, Fanchang, Nanling -- and 4 districts -- Mirror Lake, Xinwu, Matang, and Jiujiang. Since the reform and opening-up, Wuhu has maintained the high degree of openness and strong economic potentiality; it is the national opening city along the river which shares the country’s preferential policy for the coastal cities. In recent years successively it is authorized by the State Council and other National Ministries and Commissions as an experimental city for capital structure optimization, technical innovation, and new style of urban development. Moreover, it is also assigned an experiment city for State-owned enterprise reform with technical assistance from the World Bank.

Wuhu has a glorious history. It is an important commercial port along the Yangtze River, so since the ancient times it is a strategic target for both military and business powers. The cultural relics of Paleolithic period as well as the ancient bronze-smelting ruins prove that, in ancient times the technical efficiency of metallurgy and manufacture had been well-developed. Its textile industry in Ming Dynasty had reached a moderate scale. An old saying goes that “Weaving is prior in Songjiang (areas near the present Shanghai), and dyeing is super in Wuhu”. Wuhu in modern times was one of the four national major rice markets. In the second half of the Qing Dynasty it was made a foreign trading port and was one of the initializers of modern industry along the Yangtze River. Located in the downstream of the Yangtze River, Wuhu has the sub-tropic monsoon climate -- temperate with abundant rainfall and distinct seasons. The annual average temperature is 15 to 16 degrees Celsius and the annual average frost-free period is 219 to 240 days; the annual sunshine hour is about 2000 hours, and the annual average rainfall is 1200 to 1400 millimeter.

Wuhu is rich in natural resources, with favorable conditions for farming. The fertile land is preferable for rice, oil-bearing crops, cotton, and so on. The Yangtze River flows through the western boundary of the city and the Qingyi River, Shuiyang River and Zhanghe River pass through it, in addition to the Heisha Lake, Longwo Lake and Kui Lake embracing the whole area of the city; the water surface is 478 km², covering 14.4% of the total area. Its aquatic products are rich in variety, with hilsa herring, saury, crab especially well-known. The mountainous area produces the precious traditional Chinese medicine -- haw bark and so on.

55 kinds of minerals have been discovered, in which limestone reserves amounts to 4.2 billion tons. Located along the downstream of the Yangtze River, the navigable course is wide -- suitable for the development of industrial projects which require affluent water and great freight volume.

Communication and transportation: Wuhu is a hub of communication in the Yangtze River economic belt. The optic fibre cables of Nanjing-Wuhan and Nanjing-Wuhu, and Beijing-Shanghai-Hangzhou communication line all pass through Wuhu. The program-controlled telephone users of the city have amounted to 306,000. The modern communication means such as mobile communication facilities, wireless calls, etc. has been well-established. Moreover, the Internet network has also been opened.

Aviation: Wuhu Airport has opened Wuhu- Beijing and Wuhu-Foshan routes. It is 119 km away from the Luogang Airport in Hefei and 58 km in straight distance away from the newly-built Lukou International Airport in Nanjing.

Highway: Wuhu is an important hub of the highway network along the Yangtze River, with National Highway 205 and 318 passing by. It claims a total length of 1530 km of road, including 100 km of urban section. The highway from Wuhu to Hefei is already open to traffic, the expressway along the Yangtze River (Wuhu Section) is completed, the highway from Wuhu to Hangzhou has already been initiated, the project of Wuhu-Nanjing Highway will soon be started.Within the radius of one-day return trip transportation, Wuhu connects the population of 200 million in an area which is the most crowded, with considerable consuming potentials in China.

Harbor: Wuhu port is the last deepwater port up the Yangtze River. The main channel is 400-500 meter wide and the water in the whole year is 9 meters deep. Altogether there are 70 berths in the port and its annual transportation capacity amounts to 23 million tons. At Zhu Jiaqiao Foreign Trade Wharf there are two berths for 10,000 tonnage ocean-going vessels, which can bear three 5000 tonnage ocean-going ships altogether; the railway for harbour use has also been built, the annual capacity amounts to 1,520,000 tons; and its maximum of hoisting up ability is 200 tons. The Yuxikou port is national largest and also the first inland coal-transfer port on the Yangtze River and its annual transportation capacity is 6 million tons. There are 14 rivers (429km) of seasonal navigation in Wuhu. After the branch canals of the Qingyi River, Shuiyang River, and the Wuhu-Taiyi Stream are completed, Wuhu-Shen canal can be open to navigation directly. Then it is connected with the Yangtze River delta and Hangzhou, Jiading, and Shanghai of the southern Jiangsu.

Railway: Wuhu is an important hub of the second route in East China. The five railways, Wuhu-Nangjing, Anhui-Jiangxi, Huainang, Xuancheng-Hangzhou converge here and connect the whole country. The newly-built Yangtze River Bridge (highway and railway service) was open to traffic in October, 2000, connecting north and south. In the north it reaches Beijing-Kowloon and Longhai Railways; in the south it reaches Hangzhou, Ningbo and Xiamen. Xiaoyangchun marshalling yard, built for the coordination of second railway route in East China, is the first-level, three-yard, and 38-way system. It can handle 70 rows of trains and group 7000 carriages every day.

Water and electric power: Wuhu is one of the richest cities in terms of daily per capita water-supply in China. Its daily water supply amounts to 750,000 tons. The national backbone power transformer line and Wuhu Thermal Power Plant form a network with sufficient power supply. The daily gas supply is 360,000 cubic meters. As the storage and transfer center of gas in Southern Anhui, its storage amount reaches above 12,000 tons, providing sufficient gas for both the inhabitants and enterprises. Presently, the percentage of gas-users is 89.14%.

Technical education: Wuhu boasts of 71 technical research institutions, and 40,000 technical professionals, including more than ten thousand advanced and intermediate rank professionals. Wuhu is the experimental city for national comprehensive reform of education, and also the experimental city of the Chinese-German cooperation project -- the vocational education of “double unit system”. Eight universities and colleges are located in Wuhu, such as Anhui Normal University and Anhui Mechanical Science and Engineering Institute. There are 8 senior professional schools, 6 technical schools, 17 professional high schools, and 129 comprehensive middle schools. They can provide rich labor force and technical workers with fairly high quality for the local economic development.

Wuhu Yangtze River Bridge Economical Garden occupies 9.15 km² . It specializes in science and technology projects, sightseeing projects in coordination with service facilities of modern business, culture, sports, and entertainment -- forming a new area of trade, tourism, and fine ecological environment.

Wuhu Agricultural Science and Technology Model District covers a total area of 80 km², in which farming area covers 66,000 mu, aquatic farming area 42,000 mu, and mountainous farm plot 4000 mu. The Agricultural Science and Technology Model Garden is divided into five functional regions -- urban agricultural sightseeing area, high-efficiency vegetable industry area, high-efficiency fishery economic area, high-efficiency cooking oil production area, and village and small town economic and cultural area.