Formal name: People's Republic of China (PRC)
Capital: Beijing
Top legislative power: The National People's Congress ("NPC") and its Standing Committee. Representing the people and all levels of people's congresses in China, the NPC supervises all state-level institutions. Its powers include electing the President of China.
Head of State: President Hu Jintao elected March 15, 2003.
Top administrative body: The State Council, which is the cabinet or chief administrative body of the PRC that includes the heads of all governmental agencies. Headed by Premier Wen Jiabao.
National flag: Red flag with five yellow stars.
National emblem: Tiananmen Gatetower under five stars, encircled by ears of grain and with a gear wheel below.
Land size: China has a landmass of 9,600,000 sq km. It is the third largest country in the world, next only to Russia and Canada.
Population: China is the world's most populous country with a population estimated at about 1.3 billion on January 6, 2005, one-fifth of the world's total. This figure does not include the Chinese living in the Hong Kong and Macao Special Administrative Regions, and Taiwan Province.
Total GDP: US$ 2.2257trillion (2005)
GDP per capita: US$ 1703 (2005)
Foreign trade volume: US$ 1.4221 trillion (2005)
Population ethnicity: 91.6 percent of Chinese people are Han. The non-Han population includes 55 ethnic minorities, of which the major groups are the Zhuang, Manchu, Hui, Miao, Uygur, Yi, Tujia, Mongolian, and Tibetan.
Religions: The number of religious worshippers in China is estimated at well over 100 million, most of whom follow Buddhism. Other major religions are Daoism, Islam and Christianity in both its Catholic and Protestant forms.
Health: China provides wide access to primary health care and child immunizations. Average life expectancy was 71.8 years in 2002, having risen from 35 years on the eve of Liberation in 1949.
Animal: The giant panda is considered a Chinese national treasure. Just over 1,000 survive in the wild, most of them in Sichuan Province. The giant panda is one of more than 100 species of wild animals found only in China, including three endangered monkey species that are almost as rare as the panda: the black leaf monkey, the Guizhou golden monkey or snub-nosed monkey and the Yunnan golden monkey.
Flower: China does not have an "official" national flower, but the tree peony can be regarded as a national favorite. The tree peony (mudan) received the most votes in an unofficial survey conducted in 1994 in every district in China asking people to select a national flower. Other ornamental plants originating in China include the azalea and rhododendron, camellia, gardenia, hibiscus, chrysanthemum, etc.
