About Yunnan

Yunnan is located in the southwest of China, territory ranges from 21 to 29 degrees north latitude and 97 to 106 degrees east longitude, the Tropic of Cancer crosses the south of province, area is totaled at 390 thousand square kilometers. Yunnan is a mountainous province, of which around 84% consists of mountains, about 10% made up by highland and rest 6% is mainly basins and river valleys. The average altitude of province is 2000 meters, highest place hits 6740 meters and the lowest point is only 76 meters, whole terrain declines from northwest to southeast.

Population of Yunnan is over 44 million according to statistics in 2003, of which ethnic population is over 13 million, there are 51 nationalities living in Yunnan, 25 of them have own permanent residential areas and with population over 5000, and there are 15 ethnic groups uniquely belonging to this province, Hani, Dai, Lishu, Wa, Lahu, Bulang, etc...they are indispensable part of nation. Yunnan is the most ethnic province of China.

Yunnan is bordered with Guizhou Province and Guanxi Province in the east, with Sichuan in the north and also has borderline with Tibet in the northwest, besides these domestic provinces, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam are as well neighbors in the west and south, with whom Yunnan shares border of more than 4000 kilometers. Since long time ago, Yunnan has always been a passage way connecting mainland of China with Southeast Asian countries, there are more than 20 roads radiating from Kunming to different countries of IndoChina region.

Yunnan is province of low latitude and high altitude, under the influence of dry continental monsoon in the winter and humid ocean monsoon in the summer, has very assorted climate types. From June to November is the rainy season of most places, annual rainfall of different parts of Yunnan ranges from 600 millimeters to 1000 millimeters, in very south of province, annual rainfall sometimes hits 1600 millimeters, from December to May of next year is normally a dry period. Due to influential monsoon and complicated landforms, climate is very pleasant in the east of Yunnan, hot and humid in the south, cold and dry in the northwest.

Plenty of rainfall, assorted climate types, fertile soil and complicated geographic conditions offered wide range of ideal habitats for big diversity of plants and animals. Yunnan holds big number of tropical, subtropical, temperate and frigid zone botanical species, among more than 30 thousand kinds of higher plants through China, over 17 thousand can be found in Yunnan, besides, 1737 kinds of vertebrates, more than 10 thousand kinds of hexapods, enough to make Yunnan reputed as a Floral & Fauna Kingdom.