中华人民共和国驻特立尼达和多巴哥共和国大使馆经济商务处

Economic and Commercial Office of the Embassy of the People's Republic of China in the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago

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Population

China is the most populous country in the world, with 1.25909 billion people at the end of 1999, about 22 percent of the world's total. This figure does not include many Chinese in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Taiwan Province and Macao Special Administrative Region.

Family Planning

China's family planning policy combines government guidance with the wishes of the masses.

The basic requirements of family planning are late marriages and late childbearing, so as to have fewer but healthier babies, especially one child per couple.


Fifty-six Ethnic Groups

China is a united multi-ethnic nation of 56 ethnic groups. According to the fourth national census, taken in 1990, the Han people made up 91.96 percent of the country's total population, and the other 55 ethnic groups, 8.04 percent. As the majority of the population is of the Han ethnic group, China's other ethnic groups are customarily referred to as the national minorities.

The Family

China has 332.97 million families, with 3.2 people per urban household, and 4.3 people per rural household on average. In general, a Chinese family is composed of a couple and their children, but big families with three or more generations can also be found in China. Along with the pursuit of personal freedom, the trend of forming small families with only directly related members is now prevalent.


Ethnic Groups

There are 56 ethnic groups in China. The Han people form the largest, numbering 1.1 billion and making up 93.3 percent of the country's population. The other ethnic groups, that is the minority nationalities, total 160 million, only 6.7 percent of the Chinese nation.

Of the minority nationalities, 15 have over a million people each; 13 over 100,000 each; 7 over 50,000 each; and 20 have fewer than 50,000 people each.

The Han people live all over the country but their compact communities are in the Huanghe, Changjiang and Zhujiang valleys and the Songhua-Liaohe Plain of the northeast. The minority nationalities inhabit 60 percent of the country's total area, and they live mainly in the border regions.

All nationalities in China are equal, as stipulated by the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, They take part in the administration of state affairs as equals, irrespective of their numbers or the size of areas they inhabit. Every minority nationality is represented in the National People's Congress, which is the highest organ of state power of the People's Republic of China.

National regional autonomy is practiced in areas where the minority nationalities live in compact communities. There are 5 national autonomous and 75 autonomous counties (or banners in Inner Mongolia). Local autonomous governments are established and local affairs are administered by the minorities themselves. All national autonomous regions are inalienable parts of the People's Republic of China.

At present, because of various historical factors the minority nationality areas are less developed than Han areas economically and culturally. Over the last three decades, the Chinese Government has adopted many policies and measures, including the provision of manpower, financial and technical support, to help develop these minority nationality areas. Such help, of course, is a two-way street, for minority nationality areas have also contributed to the economic development of the areas inhabited by the Han people


(Information by Network Center of MOFCOM)
(News source: English Website of Ministery of Commerce)