----Luoyang is located in the western
part of Henan province, stretching across the middle reaches of
the Yellow River. It has jurisdiction over 1 city, 8 counties and
6 districts with a total area of 15,208 square kilometers including
544 square kilometers of urban area. Its population totals 6.24
million of which over 1.40 million living in urban areas. As a city
famous for its splendid history and profound culture, Luoyang has
become a shining gem in central part of China for its abundant and
characteristic modern civilization.
----Luoyang has been known as "an
ancient capital of nine dynasties ". It is among the first
cities to be declared by the State Council as the ancient capitals
and famous historical and cultural cities. Starting from the first
dynasty of China---Xia, it served as capital for 13 dynasties---Shang,
Western Zhou, Eastern Zhou, Eastern Han, Cao Wei, Western Jin, Northern
Wei, Sui, Tang, etc. It served as a capital for 1,529 years, and
thus of the 7 great ancient capitals in China, it was the first
one to have served as the capital for the most numerous dynasties
and for the longest time. Luoyang is one of the important birthplaces
of the Chinese civilization. Culture in the Yellow River and the
Luo River symbolized by the Pattern of the Yellow River and the
Writing of Luoyang is regarded as a key origin of the ancient Chinese
civilization. It was here that Taoism initiated, Confucianism originated.
Buddhism first introduced and Li School--a Confucian school of idealist
philosophy of the Song and Ming Dynasties born. Many Chinese descendants
found their roots here and cherished a deep love for the homeland.
----Luoyang is one of the top tourist
cities in China with its numerous cultural relics dotted everywhere,
picturesque landscape and national flower-Tree Peony. The city has
inherited from history such cultural heritages as ruins of the old
capital, temples and stone caves, and tombs and steles. It has 10
national sites, 75 provincial sites, and over 571 municipal sites
to be protected as cultural relics with nearly 400,000 items of
relics having been unearthed and kept in museums. The rare ruins
of the capitals from the Xia, Shang, Zhou, Han and Wei, Sui and
Tang dynasties are named "Assembly of Five Capitals ".
Longmen Grottoes is one of the three great banks of Chinese stone
sculptures that is a World Cultural Heritage. The White Horse Temple
is the first officially built monastery in China after the introduction
of Buddhism. In the Mangshan Mountain there remains the largest
group of ancient tombs in China featured by royal tombs, which took
form since the Eastern Zhou Dynasty. To the north of Luoyang is
the Mother River of the Chinese nation---the Yellow River that together
with a tourist resorts around the Xiaolangdi Reservoir and Wanshanhu
tourist area in Xin'an. To the south are spots of interests such
as the Songshan Mountain which is the central one of the Five High
Mountains of China, a national forest park at the Baiyun Mountain,
Longyu Bay and Huaguo Mountain, a magically shaped Cockscomb Karst
Cave, and tourist area around Luhun Reservoir. Known as national
beauty and heavenly fragrance, peony has been planted for nearly
1,500 years in Luoyang. Around April every year, the peony comes
into full bloom, decorating the urban areas with flooding colors.
Especially the Luoyang Peony Festival to be held every year, which
has become an occasion that attracts millions of tourists both at
home and abroad. A long history, a brilliant accumulation of culture
and a variety of beautiful natural scenery all combine to provide
Luoyang with exceptional advantages in tourist business. With rich
economic resources, strong sci-tech power and concentration of many
large enterprises, Luoyang is one of the important industrial cities
in mid-west part of China. During the first Five-Year Plan period,
7 of the 156 key projects in China were set up here and nowadays
it has developed to a new industrial base with 6 pillar industries
in machinery and electronics, petrochemistry, metallurgy, building
materials, textile, and foodstuff. Large-sized enterprise groups
appear such as Luoyang Petrochemistry General Factory, the China
first Tractor Group, Luoyang Ball Bearing (Group) Corporation, Luoyang
Bronze Processing Factory, Luoyang Float Glass Group and these enterprises
are fairly strong in their competitiveness in both international
and domestic markets in their respective fields. Luoyang enjoys
an apparent advantage in science and technology. It seats 14 scientific
research institutions attached to various ministries of the State,
and 18 backbone institutions of the province and the city. 1,972
out of every 10,000 employees are professionals, which is a proportion
above the national average. Many institutions are leading the nation
in testing and research, presenting new projects and products in
such high-tech fields as new materials, aviation and aerospace,
electronics information, and integration of machinery and electronics.
New & High-tech Industry Development Zone has become a base
for transforming traditional industries with new technology and
a window open to the outside world.
----In recent years, Luoyang has grasped
the opportunity of west development and pro-active fiscal policy
of the State, deepened the reform and quickened the development.
In 2001, a GNP reached 46.57 billion Yuan and the local revenue
exceeded 2.42 billion Yuan. The rural economy has seen stable development,
the reform of the state-owned enterprises and readjustment of industrial
structure have been deepened, and rising industries such as petrochemistry,
electrolyzed aluminum, coal and electronic information have been
developing rapidly. Focusing on to develop the southern new developing
zone, we will speed up the infrastructure and comprehensive management
with contents of " Greenness, brightness, cleanness, prettiness
and smoothness ". The urban infrastructure and management ability
has further improved, as a result of which in 2001 it has passed
appraisai of the country being a Garden and Forest City and has
been enlisted as Top Tourist City of China. Environment for tourism
has been improved greatly. In 2001 the city received 106,000 tourists
from abroad, 12.31 million tourists at home with total tourism income
of 6 billion Yuan. The strategy of achieving development through
reform has been implemented actively and friendly ties and exchanges
with foreign countries and regions have been strengthened. And by
the strategy of rejuvenating Luoyang through science and education,
various social undertakings have been making progress. Social security
system has been perfected, peoples living standard upgraded and
buildind of spiritual civilization and rule of law further promoted.
----At present Luoyang is facing favorable
development opportunities and conditions. Completion of several
key projects such as key water control project at Xiaolangdi, the
chemical fiber, laid a solid foundation foundation for city¡¯s development
in the new century. In years to come, Luoyang will implement the
policy to build up our city into a strength city in industry and
tourism, further improve strategic readjustment in economic structure.
Efforts will be made to speed up upgrading and perfection of traditional
industries and growth of rising industries, to actively develop
non-state-owned economy and to constantly increase both quality
and benefits of the economic growth. Given primary construction
to high-standard planning and high--quality in infrastructure construction,
the city will quicken urban development, further improve its environment
quality and cultural connotation and speed up process of urbanization,
thus developing tourism as an important backbone industry, Construction
on culture, democracy and rule of law will be actively enhanced.
It is hoped that through endeavors in the 10th Five-Year Plan period,
the goal of developing Luoyang into a modern industrial city equipped
with advanced science and education, and an international city backed
by rich historical culture.
----"If you want to know the rises
and falls in China, please just look at the city of Luoyang. "
We warmly welcome people from all over the world to come to Luoyang
to go on sightseeing and make friends, to search for roots, to build
industry and business, to pursue joint development with us, and
to reconstruct the splendor of the ancient capital!
