Zhoushan


Zhoushan is an urbanized archipelago with the administrative status of a prefecture-level city in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang. It consists of an archipelago of islands at the southern mouth of Hangzhou Bay off the mainland city of Ningbo. The prefecture's city proper is Dinghai on Zhoushan Island, now administered as the prefecture's Dinghai District. During the 2020 census, Zhoushan Prefecture's population was 1,157,817, out of whom 882,932 lived in the builtup area consisting of two urban districts of Dinghai and Putuo.
On July 8, 2011, the central government approved Zhoushan as Zhoushan Archipelago New Area, a state-level new area.

History

The archipelago was inhabited 6,000 years ago, during the Neolithic by people of the Hemudu culture. During the Spring and Autumn period, Zhoushan was called Yongdong, referring to its location east of the Yong River. At the time, it belonged to the state of Yue. The fishermen and sailors who inhabited the islands often engaged in piracy and became recruits for uprisings against the central authorities. At the time of the Eastern Jin, the Zhoushan Islands served as the base for Sun En's rebellion. Sun En, an adherent of the Taoist sect the Way of the Five Pecks of Rice, launched his rebellion around the year 400 and was defeated by Jin forces in 402. Today's Zhoushan was first created as in Ming Prefecture in 738 under the Tang.
In 863, the Japanese Buddhist monk Egaku and a Putuoshan local Zhang-shi placed a statue of Guanyin at Chaoyin Cave that would later become a popular tourist and pilgrim destination. In 1073, under the Song, it was renamed ; this was upgraded to a prefecture in the early Yuan dynasty. During the Ming dynasty, especially between the years 1530 and 1560, Japanese and Chinese pirates used Zhoushan as one of their principal bases from which they launched attacks as far as Nanjing; "the whole Chinese coast from northern Shandong to western Guangdong was ravaged to a distance of sixty miles inland."
After suppression of the pirates, Zhoushan became an important commercial port of entry. Under the early Qing dynasty, it played a similar role to Xiamen and Guangzhou as a frequent port of call for Western traders. Changguo Prefecture became within Zhejiang Province in 1688 under the Qing. The restriction of all European trade to the port of Guangzhou in 1760 forced Westerners to leave Zhoushan. One of the requests of Lord Macartney's embassy to the Qianlong Emperor in 1793 was an acquisition of "a small unfortified island near Zhoushan for the residence of English traders, storage of goods, and outfitting of ships." The Qianlong Emperor denied this request together with all the rest.
British forces under Captain Charles Elliot captured Zhoushan on July 5–6, 1840 during the First Opium War and evacuated it in early 1841, after Elliot reached an agreement with Qishan, the Governor-General of Tianjin and Grand Secretary to the Daoguang Emperor, in exchange for Hong Kong. At that time, Zhoushan was a well known port while Hong Kong was still only a fishing village. The British Foreign Secretary Palmerston was furious when he learned that Elliot agreed to the cede Zhoushan for Hong Kong, described as "a barren island with hardly a house on it". Elliot was dismissed in April 1841 for his blunder. His replacement Sir Henry Pottinger led a British fleet that recaptured Zhoushan on October 1, 1841. The First Opium War ended with conclusion of the Treaty of Nanjing in which China opened up the cities of Guangzhou, Fuzhou, Xiamen, Ningbo, and Shanghai to residence by British subjects for the purpose of trade. As a result, Britain no longer had any use for Zhoushan but it kept the island until 1846 as a guarantee for the treaty. Dinghai was upgraded to a directly controlled subprefecture sometime in 1841.
Zhoushan was also occupied by the British in 1860 during the Second Opium War. Wang Yijun, a leader of the Taiping rebels, attempted to retake Zhoushan from its Qing garrison on February 13, 1862 but was defeated and killed.
Following the Xinhai Revolution and the establishment of the Republic of China, Dinghai Subprefecture reverted to a county. Sun Yat-sen visited Zhoushan on August 25, 1916, writing Sun Yat-sen's Travels in Putuo. On October 1, 1942, the Japanese ship Lisbon Maru was transporting 1,800 POWs to Tokyo when she was attacked by the USSGrouper off Qingbing or Dongfu; one torpedo hit and she sank the next day. The fishermen of nearby Dongji rescued 384 of the British prisoners from the wreckage. Amid the Chinese Civil War, Dinghai County lost Shengsi, which became an Archipelago Directly controlled District of Jiangsu in 1946, then a separate county in October 1949. The same year, Dinghai County was divided into Dinghai and Wengzhou Counties. In November, the Communists landed on Dengbu Island, but were repulsed by the defenders.
Nevertheless, Zhoushan was overrun by the Communists on May 17, 1950. Wengzhou was merged back into Dinghai County, which made up part of Ningbo Prefecture, and Shengsi made up a special area and then county of the Songjiang Prefecture, then still part of Jiangsu. In March 1953, the Council of Ministers opted to establish the Zhoushan Prefecture, returning Shengsi and dividing Dinghai into Dinghai, Putuo, and Daishan. Ningbo's Xiangshan County was also briefly incorporated into this new prefecture from 1954 to 1958. From 1958 to May 1962, Zhoushan was incorporated into Ningbo before becoming a separate prefecture again. Shengsi was temporarily assigned to Shanghai in the early 1960s. The short-lived Daqu County was created in 1962 before being redivided between Daishan and Shengsi four years later.
Zhoushan was promoted to a prefecture-level "city" on January 27, 1987, with Dinghai and Putuo Counties upgraded to districts. The municipal People's Government was established on March 8 of that year. April of the same year, the ports of Zhoushan became open to foreign ships. On April 10, 1988, it became a coastal economic open zone.

Administrative divisions

Zhoushan administers two districts and two counties. The city currently consists of 36 township-level divisions, including 17 towns, 5 townships and 14 subdistricts. Detailed divisions are listed as follows.
  • Dinghai District
  • *Sub-district: Jiefang, Changguo, Huannan, Chengdong, Yancang, Lincheng, Qiandao, Xiaosha, Ma'ao, Cengang
  • *Town: Baiquan, Jintang, Ganlan
  • Putuo District
  • *Sub-district: Shenjiamen, Donggang, Zhanmao, Zhujiajian
  • *Town: Putuoshan, Dongji, Taohua, Xiazhi, Liuheng
  • Daishan County
  • *Town: Gaoting, Qushan, Changtu, Dongsha, Daidong, Daixi
  • *Township: Xiushan
  • Shengsi County
  • *Town: Caiyuan, Yangshan, Shengshan
  • *Township: Wulong, Huanglong, Gouqi, Huaniao
In particular, Qiandao and Lincheng sub-districts of Dinghai District are governed by a special new town administration committee of Zhoushan.

Geography

The Zhoushan Archipelago, comprising 1,390 islands and 3,306 reefs, is outside of Hangzhou Bay. It is the largest archipelago of China. Among these islands, 103 are inhabited all year round, 58 are larger than, and only 12 have populations over 10,000. Below is a list of major inhabited islands.
There are six major islands :
  • Zhoushan Island,, 635,595
  • Daishan Island,, 111,765
  • Liuheng Island,, 59,102
  • Jintang Island,, 37,321
  • Zhujiajian Island,, 27,981
  • Qushan Island,, 53,016
There are 11 middle-size islands :
  • Taohua Island,, 10,867
  • Greater Changtu Island,, 1,750
  • Xiushan Island,, 10,106
  • Sijiao Island,, 39,008
  • Xiazhi Island,, 11,247
  • Dengbu Island,, 2,479
  • Mount Putuo,, 10,337
  • Cezi Island,, 6,334
  • Changbai Island,, 3,066
  • Lesser Changtu Island,, 19,750
  • Dayu Island,, 788
Zhoushan includes of marine territory, but only of land, of which are submerged during high tides. It is east-west and north-south and although heavily populated now has few farms.

Climate

Zhoushan has a four-season, monsoon-influenced humid subtropical climate, with cool, damp winters, and hot, humid summers. Conditions, especially during summer, are generally moderated by the surrounding waters of the East China Sea, bringing a January average of and August average of, with an annual mean of. The highest temperature on record was on 8 August 2013, which is 1.7°C higher than the second highest temperature. Precipitation is significant throughout the year, with the greatest rainfall during summer. With 1,823.7 hours of bright sunshine annually, ranging from 30% sunshine in June to 53% in July and August, the second half of the year is sunnier.

Demographics

According to the report from the Sixth National Population Census of the People's Republic of China, the total population of Zhoushan Municipality is 1,121,261 with 588,414 males and 532,847 females as of 1 November 2010, among which an overwhelmingly majority is Han Chinese. The number of households is about 454,800. For an administrative division distribution, Dinghai District has a population of 464,184, Putuo District has a population of 378,805, Daishan County has a population of 202,164 and Shengsi County has a population of 76,108. In terms of education attainment, about 10 percent of the total population has received higher education, while a population of 77,577 is illiterate or semiliterate. In terms of age distribution, there is a child population of 114,265 and a senior population of 176,331.

Economy

Traditionally Zhoushan had relied heavily on the primary sector, especially fishing, given Zhoushan is the largest fishery in China. Nowadays with the development of the secondary and tertiary sectors, Zhoushan's economic base has been largely diversified. Ship building and repairing, shipping, light industry, tourism and service industry grow to be the major contributors of local economic output. In 2016, the entire municipality achieved a total Gross Domestic Product of 122.85 billion yuan, with an increase of 11.3% from the previous year. The city continuously ranked 3rd among 11 municipalities of Zhejiang Province. However, since Zhoushan has a significantly smaller population compared with other municipalities, the absolute figure of total GDP still ranked the last place in the province. The structure of three sectors of industry is 10.6 : 39.8 : 49.6. In 2012, Zhoushan Port alone processed 290,990 kilotons of cargo. If combined with Ningbo Port, the entire greater port handled approximately 744,000 kilotons of cargo, surpassing Shanghai Port to be world's new busiest port in terms of cargo tonnage.
In 2012, Zhoushan's per capita disposable income of urban residents reached 34,224 yuan, with a 12.2% increase from the previous year. On the other hand, Zhoushan's per capital net income of rural residents reached 18,601 yuan, with a 12.9% increase from the previous year. The Engel's Coefficients for urban and rural residents are 35.9% and 38.1% respectively. The average housing building areas are 32.39 and 49.10 square meters for urban and rural residents respectively.