Tashkurgan County

Origin
In the West Han period, today's Tashkurgan and its neighboring area was "Puli" state, "Yinai" state, "Xiye" of the 36 countries of the western Regions.
In East Han period, it was called "Deruo". In the Wei Dynasty it was called "Puli". According to many historical record, it was called "pantuo" from the beginning of the 1st A.D. to North Wei and Tang Dynasty and then, the tang dynasty established "Cong ling shou zhuo " here. In the 18th year of Guangxu emperor (1902 A.D.), the Qing government established " " here. After the 1911 revolution, "Puli" was changed for "Puli" county.Tashkurgan county was established on September 17, 1954.

Administrative Division

It has jurisdiction over 10 countries, 2 towns, and 2 farms now.

Population and Territory
Governing an area of 25000 mou, by the end of 2003, the population of the county totaled 33,204, among which 27,003 were Tajik, taking 87% of the total population; the non-agriculture population was 9,319, 28% of the total.

Natural Characteristics
Located on the Pamirs plateau to the northwest of the motherland, the arable land is 651,000,000 mou. It belongs to the dry continental temperate zone, the annual mean temperature of the air is 3.6 ℃s, the average precipitation measures to 68.1 mm, annual frost-free period is 113 days,

Natural Resources
It has a great variety of natural resources, such as wild plant, mineral resources, underground heat, solar energy and wind power.
and wildlife, such as snow leopard, argali, green sheep, brown bear, eagle, snow chicken, golden eagle, bittern, etc. The eastern mountain area is densely covered by various trees such as larch, phoenix tree, birch etc. and precious wild herbs such as snow lotus, dangshen, dragonhead etc. there are more than 30 types of mineral resources in 19 categories, such as gold, mineral spring water, iron, mica, crystal , green jade, sulphur iron mine, copper and molybdenum.
The identified exploitable glacier water, hot springs water, the mineral spring has already been known home and abroad for their good quality and there are large margins for further development.

People's Living Standards
In 2003, GDP of the county amounted to 156,549,000, the agriculture production value totaled 58,270,600 Yuan RMB. Among them the industry production value totaled 5,164,000 Yuan RMB, agriculture production value totaled 53,106,600 Yuan RMB.The per capita income of urban resident was 17,551 Yuan RMB, the per capita net income of farmers was 930 Yuan RMB.

Industry
Eight industry enterprises with a fixed asset of 12,432,000 Yuan RMB are within the county.

Agriculture
By the end of 2003, arable land amounted to 65100 mou, 2.9 mou per capita, with a total output of 5,557,327 kilograms, 171,845 livestock's on hand for sale by the end of the year, 8.4 per capita.
Quality Tashkurgan karakul and yak breeding bases have been set up.

Finance and Tax Income
The county completed the public finance income of 4,640,000 Yuan RMB, various tax revenue 6,090,000 Yuan RMB, tax receipts 5,670,000 Yuan RMB, among which the local tax revenue accounted for 3,350,000 Yuan RMB,the tax receipts of the provincial level was 970,000 Yuan RMB dollars, the tax receipts of the central governmental level was 1,350,000 Yuan RMB. By the end of the year 2003, the extra deposit of the rural and urban residents amounted to 57,003 Yuan RMB.

Business and Investment
There are 570 business networks with 855 staffs completed a total sales volume of social customer goods of 19,096,000 Yuan RMB, and the value added in the tertiary industry is 57,946,000  Yuan RMB.
In 2003, Tashkurgan county drew in investment 206,999,999 Yuan RMB, among them foreign capital accounted for 150,000,000 Yuan RMB.

Nonstate-owned Enterprises
By the end of 2003, there were 8 registered nonstate-owned enterprises with a fixed assets of 8,760,000 Yuan RMB and the total assets of 6,000,000 Yuan RMB and created a tax revenue of 180,000 Yuan RMB, taking 4 percent in the GDP.


Transportation and Communication
Traffic is easy and quick. National highway 314 running through the county. By the end of 2003, the overall mileage of the county amounted to 541 kilometers, every 100 square kilometers has 2.1 kilometers mileage of highway. There are 14,021 SPC telephone customers, and 2000 mobile phone customer, all of which can enjoy the SPC telephone exchangeservice.The coverage rate of phones reached 36.4 %.

Urban and Rural Construction
Since 1998, the steps of city construction kept increasing. With the newly built area of 434,000 square meters, the living condition of the urban citizens has been greatly improved and the average urban resident has a housing area of 11.12 square meters and the average rural resident has a housing area of 15.7 square meters.

Water Conservancy and Electric Power
Water resources is abundant. Five rivers dominated by Tashkurgan River running through the county. There is one reservoir and one hydropower station with an annual generated electrical energy of 600 kwh. Power lines spread densely and can live up to the basic demand of production and living.

Culture and Education
There are culture institutions such as archivess, house of culture etc, one television station, and one broadcasting station .7,077 students were enrolled in 15 schools with a pupil enrollment rate of 98.1%, junior high school enrollment rate of 46% and college enrollment rate of 32%. In 2003, 45 students passed the college entrance examination.

Athletics and Hygiene
In the traditional sports items long-distance running athletes from our county got 12 gold medal, 13 silver medals, and 16 Bronze Medals of provincial or region level.
There is one county level hospital, one epidemic prevention station and 13 village clinics
with 262 medical workers, among which 7, 53 and 129 have got A, B and C certificate respectively
and with 163 hospital beds, 2 ambulance and some other medical treatment equipment.
Popularity of Science and Technology  By 2003, there are 863 technicians of all sorts, among them 18 and 128 got advanced and middle level certificate. By the end of 2003, one private science and technology research center was set up which have put one scientific item into  practice, developed 2 new products and applied 2 patients.

Environment Protection and Green Belt
Discharge reached the national standard, the air pollution was controlled above the level A. The green area totals 72,000 square meters with 44,000 trees, taking 24 percent of the city proper.

Social Welfare and Social Security
There is 1 welfare hospital with 9 senior citizens in it,one welfare school with 55 orphans. The insurance business only have property insurance now, covering 300 items, and has dealt with 46 cases and made reparation payment of 41,000,000 Yuan RMB with a compensate rate of 35%.

Featured Industry
The county is strive to quicken pace of further developing tour resources taking advantage of port superiority. Every year businessmen from more than 30 countries come to trade in ports here .
There are three national class A tour resources, i.e., mount Muztagata, mount Qogir, and Stone City. Five national B class tour resources, i.e., Taheman Spring, princess' castle, qogir Glaciers, gold grass shoal, the border stone of Honqirap Pass. Four class c national tour resources and 13 class D tour resources Handicraft and Tajik embroidery works are abundant such as four-cornered floral embroidery hat, budge hat, embroidery handkerchief, embroidery belt,
eagle-bone whistle, etc.
There are a dozen of local cuisines such as horse milk, yak milk, yoghourt made of sheep milk,
There is a large margin for the development of the highland barley wine A spring water company was set up-Hong kong Spring Water limited cooperation to process the rare mineral spring, hot spring water, glacier water with an annual production of 20,000 tons.

Natural Landscape and Human Landscape
Icebergs and valleys abounded in this area, in the south stands the second peak of the world the Gogar Peak, in the north erects "the father of glaciers"-mount Muztagata.

Here have the ancient cultural ruins with a history of 5000---10000 years and human bone from the 8 to 10 century B.C., and dry corpses of 500 years before.
The enchanting land is attracting quite a number of visitors, experts from home and abroad who wish to view the uniqueness of the ancient silk road and the beauty of the stone city, Princess' mansion in the prime Tang Dynasty and the ancient tombs of the new stone age.