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Since the prefectural and county system was established in Qin Dynasty (221 BC-206 BC), Divisive Map of Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China, the first ever of its kind on a scale of 1:4,000,000, will formally be brought out early this month.
Co-drawn by the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping, the map will be published by China Map Publishing House. The sample map, 1640mm by 1184mm, has been finished. As learned, the sample fully reflects the success achieved in the national survey of provincial boundaries, stressing the administrative boundaries at provincial level and paying special attention to the ownership of dwelling areas along provincial borderlines. Editor in chief of China Map Publishing House noted that the map on a scale of 1:4,000,000 is the first one in history that marks the legal boundaries of administrative regions, and also forms an important criterion and basis for map-making on the same or even smaller scale. Therefore, the drawing work calls for high accuracy.
Before the national boundary surveying, only 5 percent of provincial administrative boundaries were of legal effect, while customary and controversial ones accounted for a respective 77 and 18 percent. In the Chinese history of several thousand years, China's domestic administrative regions have never been clearly defined.
The boundary drawing of districts and counties in Beijing is also being carried out on the basis of results of the survey. According to Gui Jianyong, deputy director-general of the cartography center under Surveying and Mapping Institute of Beijing, the sample of Chongwen district has been submitted to relevant department for check and approval, and it is going to be finished by the yearend. Then it will be followed with the sample map of Shunyi district. When samples of the 18 districts and counties are brought to an end, they will set about drafting the map of Beijing.
(People's Daily December 3, 2002)
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