Tibet Autonomous Region

Xizang is a redirect to this article. For the asteroid, see (2344) Xizang .

西藏自治区
Xīzàng zìzhìqū ( Pinyin )
བོད་ རང་སྐྱོང་ ལྗོངས་
bod rang skyong ljongs ( Tibet. )

Abbreviation : 藏 ( Pinyin : Zàng)
Capital	Lhasa
surface  - Total  - share in the PRC	Rank 2 of 33 1,268,947 km² 12.8%
population  - Total 2016  - density	Rank 32 out of 33 3,310,000 inhabitants 2.61 inhabitants / km²
Management type	Autonomous area
governor	Che Dalha
ISO-3166-2 code	CN-XZ
District level	3 administrative districts, 4 independent cities
District level	69 districts, 4 city districts
Community level	535 parishes, 140 large parishes, 9 street districts, 8 nationality parishes

Tibetan name
Tibetan script : བོད་ རང་སྐྱོང་ ལྗོངས །
Wylie transliteration : bod rang skyong ljongs
Official transcription of the PRCh : Poi Ranggyongjong
THDL transcription : Bo Rangkyong Jong
Chinese name
Traditional : 西藏自治區
Simplified : 西藏自治区
Pinyin : Xīzàng Zìzhìqū

The Tibet Autonomous Region is an autonomous administrative unit of the People's Republic of China in the area of ​​historical Tibet , where, in addition to the Tibetans , members of other ethnicities or nationalities also live. In turn, Tibetans also live in the neighboring provinces of southwest and northwest China, mostly in autonomous districts .

Geography and politics

Tibet as part of the highlands of Tibet and its adjacent regions and countries

The Tibet Autonomous Region was created on September 1, 1965 as an administrative unit in the People's Republic of China. Representatives of the Tibetan government-in-exile see this as a change in the existing political system in contradiction to the agreement on the peaceful liberation of Tibet . It has an area of ​​1.22 million square kilometers. This administrative unit comprises the central Tibetan former provinces Ü and Tsang , Ngari , large parts of the Changthang and the western part of the Kham cultural region . Thus it corresponds roughly to the former sphere of influence of the Dalai Lamas , makes up about half of the Tibet-Qinghai highlands and covers about half of the Tibetan cultural area.

The Tibetan areas claimed and controlled by India are included in this area, these are: two sections each in the west of Gar district and two in the south of Zanda district , both in the administrative district of Ngari (western Tibet), as well as the entire south (southwest) of the districts Cona , Mêdog and Zayü in the Shannan administrative district and the city of Nyingchi (southeast Tibet). The affiliation of these areas to India is questioned by China under international law. The state of Arunachal Pradesh was formed from parts of the counties Cona, Mêdog and Zayü and some smaller areas claimed by India .

Large parts of Kham and the cultural province of Amdo , if they had ever belonged to the sphere of influence of the Dalai Lamas , were incorporated into the provinces of Sichuan , Yunnan , Qinghai and Gansu from the 18th and early 20th centuries and were therefore not part of the Tibet Autonomous Region.

In official Chinese usage, the term “Tibet” always stands for the Tibet Autonomous Region; however, the Tibetan term bö བོད ། also includes Tibetan areas outside the autonomous region are usually not included. In order to include them as well, the Tibetan language བོད་ ཆེན ། ("Greater Tibet"; Chinese Dà Zàngqū 大 藏区) are used.

The chairman of the Tibetan government is currently Qamba Püncog .

population

The 2010 census of the People's Republic of China determined a population of 3,002,165 for the Tibetan Autonomous Region (population density: approx. 2.34 inh / km²). All Tibetan groups in China together should actually have a total population of just over five million (2005).

Around 250,000 people live in the urban area of Lhasa , 120,000 in Samzhubzê , 25,000 in Chengguan and 16,000 in Bayi . According to official figures, 81% of the people in Tibet live in the countryside and 19% of the people in Tibet live in the cities.

Population development

Population growth in the province since 1954.

year	population
1954 census	1,273,969
1964 census	1,251,225
1982 census	1,892,393
1990 census	2,196,010
2000 census	2,616,329
2010 census	3,002,165
Guess 2016	3,310,000

Ethnic classification

ethnicities

Name of the people	Residents	proportion of
Tibetans	2,427,168	92.77%
Han	158,570	6.06%
Hui	9,031	0.35%
Monba	8,481	0.32%
Deng / Dengba, Sherpa and Thami	3.817	0.15%
Lhoba	2,691	0.10%
Naxi	1,223	0.05%
Bai	722	0.03%
Uighurs	701	0.03%
Mongols	690	0.03%
Others	3,235	0.11%

1. ↑ ethnicity not yet defined

religion

Monks in Sera

The predominant religion is Tibetan Buddhism . According to official Chinese figures, there are currently over 1,700 sites for Tibetan Buddhist activities in Tibet with around 46,000 Buddhist monks and nuns. There are also four mosques in Tibet for over 3000 Muslims (members of the Hui nationality) and a Catholic church for over 700 Catholics.

language

In 2002, a law in the Tibet Autonomous Region established that the Tibetan language had the same legal force and status as the standard Chinese language used throughout the country . For schools, this means that the Tibetan language and writing must be included as a compulsory subject in the teaching program of all schools in the Tibet Autonomous Region. For important conferences, assemblies and meetings held in Tibet or in court, the law stipulates that anyone can voluntarily choose and use the Tibetan language or the national language (Han Chinese). An educated citizen in Tibet should be able to speak both the Tibetan and the Chinese languages.

Social development

telecommunications

All districts of Tibet are connected to the national self-dialing network of China and there are also Internet connections, as in all of China. The mobile network is currently being expanded across the board.

Healthcare and education

The enrollment rate in 2008 was 98.5% at primary school, 92.2% at middle school, 51.2% at high school, and 19.7% at university.

According to the Tibetan Regional Ministry of Education in Lhasa, the total number of students attending elementary, middle schools and universities in Tibet is 380,000. This number corresponds to 15 percent of the total population.

Tibet has six years of compulsory schooling across the board. As a rule, teaching is in the Tibetan language . School fees are charged for further education.

Currently, Tibet has a population of 2.6 million, of which one million have received a decent education. According to official figures, the illiteracy rate in Tibet has fallen from 44.7% in 1991 to 32%.

The development of medical care increased life expectancy in Tibet from 35 years in 1959 to 67 years in 2008 and 68.2 years in 2013. The eight year lower life expectancy in Tibet than in the rest of China is partly due to the difficult situation Living conditions at an altitude of over 4000 m have been reduced. It is the official goal of the Chinese government to increase life expectancy to 70 years by 2020.

economy

Agriculture

Farmers repair a dam. In the background a field with highland barley

The most common fruit in Tibet is highland barley. Wheat, potatoes, corn and legumes are also grown where the climate allows it. Because of the long hours of sunshine and the long growing season, agriculture is still possible even at this high altitude, but only in relatively small areas of Tibet, in the area around Lhasa and Samzhubzê . Soon to the north only cattle breeding is possible, to the west the desert begins. Agriculture has been mechanized in recent years through the use of machines and total yields have increased. However, pasture farming (sheep, yaks ) on the high steppes is still more important .

Industry

The industry is still underdeveloped, but it is supported by the Chinese central government and is growing very quickly. There is a mining industry for the extraction of iron , gold , lithium , copper , salt , borax . For lithium and borax, Tibet has the world's largest deposits.

Another major economic sector is the building materials industry .

structure

The following table shows the development of the value of annual industrial production and the forms of ownership of the companies.

Gross production value and forms of ownership of industry

year	A total of	Forms of ownership			Production value in 10,000 yuan
		State enterprise	Collective enterprise	Other	Light industry	Heavy industry
1959	4,344	4,243	101		164	4.120
1965	2,349	1,797	552		892	1,457
1970	3,734	2,857	877		1,419	2,315
1975	11.306	8,649	2,657		4,296	7,010
1980	14,894	13,818	1,076		4,600	10,294
1985	21,247	13,950	1,958	5,339	10,765	10,482
1990	37,200	25,395	4,230	7,575	14,518	22,682
1995	90.816	65,679	13,909	11,228	28,479	62,339
2000	183.036	94,970	14,090	57,234	65,626	100.384
2003	239,635	105.503	40.209	93,923	89,753	149,882

tourism

The Mount Everest seen from Tibet

Tourism is being expanded in a targeted manner and has achieved growth rates of over 25% annually in recent years. In 2005, over a million tourists visited the AGT, including over 100,000 foreigners. In 2010 it was 6.85 million who contributed 14.1% to the Tibetan gross domestic product via income of 7.14 billion yuan renminbi . In 2011 there were already 8.5 million tourists. The Lhasa Railway as an alternative to the airplane is an essential element in the expansion of tourism . For this purpose, the wagons of the Lhasa line were provided with panoramic windows and the line with stops at special viewpoints.

At the growth rates of recent years, 15 million tourists are expected in Tibet annually from 2015 ^{[out of date]} . According to state plans, a third of all workers in the Tibet Autonomous Region will be employed in tourism by 2020. 80 to 90 percent of tourists in Tibet are citizens of the People's Republic of China. The largest group of foreign tourists is Japanese, with the number of Americans and Europeans growing.

traffic

The traditional means of transport are caravans of pack animals ( yaks ). Until 50 years ago, this was the only means of transport, especially since there were no roads. Today the transport system is essentially dominated by road transport. Since the annexation of Tibet by the People's Republic of China (1951), over 20,000 km of highways have been laid. Connections have been made to Nepal , Sikkim , Xinjiang , Qinghai and Sichuan , the quality of which is constantly being improved.

Prayer flags on the Friendship Highway

Despite road construction, one of the main factors hindering Tibet's economic development is its poor infrastructure. For this reason, railway lines, roads, airports, power supply and telecommunications are currently being built up and expanded at an accelerated rate.

The Friendship Highway was until a few years ago, a difficult to be traveled gravel road between the city of Lhasa and the Sino-Nepal Friendship Bridge on the Tibet-Nepal border in Nyalam. Today the entire route has been expanded with a modern, paved road.

Lhasa

From 2001 to 2005 the Lhasa Railway was built, a 1125 km long railway line from Golmud in central China to the Tibetan capital Lhasa . It is a railway line mostly 4000 m above sea level. Since 2007, goods such as oil, coal, building materials, goods from the Tibetan mining industry and others have been able to be transported over a railway line at a fraction of the previous cost and no longer have to be transported by truck on the highways of Tibet. This gives the Lhasa Railway a key position in the further economic development of Tibet.

The railway line is of great importance for the tourism industry today. Critics fear, however, that this will facilitate the arrival of Han Chinese and that the ethnic structure will be changed to the detriment of the Tibetans. However, Lhasa can already be reached in two days by bus from the Chinese lowlands.

From 2010 to 2014 the railway line was extended to Xigatse . The construction of the route was very complex. About half of the route runs in tunnels or on bridges. An extension of the route to the capital of Nepal, to Kathmandu , is being planned. This worries the Indian government, because up to now Nepal has been in the Indian sphere of influence through trade and traffic.

The Tibet Autonomous Region currently has (as of 2013) over five civilian airports: the Lhasa Gonggar Airport near the capital, the qamdo bamda airport in the town of Qamdo and Nyingchi-Mainling airport of the city of Nyingchi ; In 2010, the modern airports Xigazê in the administrative district of Xigazê and Ngari were opened.

Nagqu Dagring Airport , located at an altitude of 4,436 meters in the administrative district of Nagqu , is currently under construction, and once it is completed it will become the highest airport in the world.

gross domestic product

According to official Chinese statistics, the gross domestic product of the Chinese Autonomous Region of Tibet exceeded 20 billion yuan in 2004 . The autonomous region has thus recorded economic growth of over 12 percent for four years in a row. In 2000, the gross domestic product was 11.75 billion yuan, in 1994 it was 5 billion yuan. In 2006, the gross domestic product reached 29 billion yuan (EUR 2.9 billion), with a growth of 13.2% compared to 2005.

Gross domestic product of the Tibet Autonomous Region
in billion yuan
(at current prices)

year	GDP
1978	000.6
1980	000.9
1985	001.8
1990	002.8
1995	005.6
2000	012
2004	020th
2006	029
2007	034
2010	051
2012	070
2013	080
2015	103

Investment in physical assets in Tibet grew 20 percent in 2004 compared to 2003.

While traditional agriculture and animal husbandry continue to play a central role in rural areas, in the cities in 2005 the service sector overtook the primary industry (raw material production) sector .

The disposable income of a Tibetan in 2005 was US $ 1051 in the cities and US $ 259 in the countryside. This was 30.4% more in the cities and 55.9% more in the countryside than in 2000. Nevertheless, she is alive Majority of Tibetans in rural areas to this day in simple to very simple circumstances.

production

The production quantities of important goods in the Tibet Autonomous Region have developed as follows in recent years.

Production of important products

year	Chrome ores in tons	Electricity in kWh	Cement in tons	Wood in 10,000 m³	Traditional Chinese medicine in tons
1959		88		6th
1965		2,782	10,600	7th
1970	300	5,302	3,600	7th
1975	200	10,488	34,000	17th
1980	50,300	17,459	52,200	21st	101
1985	14.101	24,668	48,668	21st	82
1990	93,120	31,582	132,345	21st	55
1995	109,882	48,343	219,952	16	222
1999	183,661	63,323	390,373	13th	538
2000	196.628	66,075	493.200	12	591
2001	159,446	69,690	495,900	10	697
2002	124.222	79,650	590,300	5	995
2003	155,796	101,600	889.100	6th	889

1. ↑ ^{a b} Felling in Tibet was reduced from 210,000 m³ in the 1980s to 50,000 to 60,000 m³ in 2002 and 2003. This is part of the new environmental policy requirements.

Administrative structure

→ Main article : Administrative divisions of Tibet (Autonomous Region)

Biggest cities

The population figures are based on the 2010 census and refer to the actual urban settlement.

	city	Residents
1	Lhasa	199.159
2	Xigazê	63,967
3	Qamdo	44,028
4th	Nagqu	42,984
5	Nyingchi	35.179

See also

Portal: Tibet  - Overview of Wikipedia content on Tibet

literature

• Tsering Shakya: The Dragon in the Land of Snows. A History of Modern Tibet Since 1947 (London, Pimlico 1999), ISBN 0-7126-6533-1 .
• Melvyn C. Goldstein: A History of Modern Tibet, 1913-1951 (University of California Press 1991), ISBN 0-520-07590-0 .
• Melvyn C. Goldstein: The Snow Lion and the Dragon. China, Tibet, and the Dalai Lama. (University of California Press 1997), ISBN 0-520-21951-1 .
• A. Tom Grunfeld: The Making of Modern Tibet (University of California Press, London-Delhi 1987), ISBN 0-520-21951-1 ; (New edition ME Sharpe 1996, ISBN 1-56324-714-3 ).
• Jin Hui: Social History of Tibet, China . Documented and Illustrated. (Beijing, Intercontinental Press 1995), ISBN 7-80113-022-7 .
• Wáng Jiawei王家伟, Nyima Gyaincain (Nyima rGyal-mtshan / Nímǎ Jiānzàn尼玛坚赞): The historical status of China's Tibet ( Zhōngguó Xizang de lìshǐ Diwei中国西藏的历史地位), Beijing, China Intercontinental Press / ( Wǔzhōu chuánbō chūbǎnshè北京 五洲 传播 出版社 2003), ISBN 7-80113-304-8 .
• Zhang Tianlu: Population Development in Tibet and Related Issues (Beijing, Foreign Languages ​​Press 1997), ISBN 7-119-01867-1 .
• Zheng Shan: A History of Development of Tibet (Beijing, Foreign Languages ​​Press 2000), ISBN 7-119-01865-5 .
• Elliot Sperling: The Tibet-China Conflict - History and Polemics East-West Center, Washington 2004, Online (PDF)
• Alan Winnington : Tibet. The true story. Verlag Das neue Berlin, 2008, ISBN 978-3-360-01955-4 .
• Birgit Zotz : Destination Tibet. Tourist image between politics and cliché. Hamburg 2010 ISBN 978-3-8300-4948-7

Web links

• Press Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China:
  • The regional autonomy of nationalities in Tibet ( China.org.cn , May 2004)
  • Tibet's ecological development and environmental protection ( China.org.cn , March 2003)
  • Tibet's March Toward Modernization ( China.org.cn , November 2001)
  • The Development of Tibetan Culture ( China.org.cn , June 2000)
  • New Progress in Human Rights in the Tibet Autonomous Region ( China.org.cn , February 1998)
  • Tibet - Its Ownership And Human Rights Situation ( China.org.cn , September 1992)
• Tibet - economic policy and economic development goals official statement from the Chinese embassy in Germany

Individual evidence

1. ↑ China: Provinces and Major Cities - Population Statistics, Maps, Charts, Weather, and Web Information. Retrieved May 6, 2018 . 
2. ↑ 2000 年 人口普查 中国 民族 人口 资料 ， 民族 出版社/ Tabulation on nationalities of 2000 population census of China (compiled by the National Bureau of Statistics and the Commission on Ethnic Affairs of the People's Republic of China) 2003/9 ( ISBN 7-105-05425-5 )
3. ↑ ^{a b} Part V: Development and Progress of Tibet in the Last 50 Years. In: german.beijingreview.com.cn. Retrieved February 19, 2015 . 
4. ↑ china.org, November 23, 2015
5. ↑ ^{a b} Output Value of Industry in Tibet: Tibet - Facts and Figures 2005
6. ↑ ^{a b} Embassy of the People's Republic of China in the Federal Republic of Germany: Tibet hopes for more tourists , January 14, 2011, accessed February 14, 2011
7. ↑ Tourism: Tibet records an increase in visitors - Radio China International. In: german.cri.cn. July 8, 2013, accessed February 19, 2015 . 
8. ↑ See Birgit Zotz: Destination Tibet. Tourist image between politics and cliché. Hamburg 2010, pp. 40–46
9. ↑ Sudha Ramachandran: Delhi sweats as China inches toward Nepal. October 16, 2010, archived from the original on July 9, 2012 ; Retrieved October 3, 2015 . 
10. ↑ World's highest-altitude airport planned on Tibet . Xinhua News Agency January 12, 2010. Archived from the original on December 15, 2010. Retrieved on December 12, 2010.
11. ↑ ^{a b} Record-breaking economic growth in Tibet . December 2006. Retrieved January 20, 2007.
12. ↑ Official presentation, January 2008
13. ↑ Tibet Facts and Figures 2005
14. ↑ Harmony in Tibet . showchina.org. Archived from the original on April 8, 2014. Retrieved October 3, 2015.
15. ↑ Tibet's gross domestic product will increase in 2012 . cri.cn. January 18, 2013. Retrieved October 3, 2015.
16. ↑ Double- digit economic growth in Tibet in 2013 . china.org.cn. January 12, 2014. Retrieved October 3, 2015.
17. ↑ GDP for 2015 ( memento of March 24, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
18. ↑ Xizang / Tibet (China): Autonomous Region, Cities & Counties - Population Statistics, Maps, Graphics, Weather and Web Information. Retrieved December 11, 2017 . 

Coordinates: 31 ° 42 '  N , 86 ° 56'  E