Taiwan Introduction

Taiwan Introduction

Basic information• Population: 23.37 million people
• Area: 36194 square kilometers
• Nation: Han (97%), aboriginal (2%), others (1%)
• Language: Mandarin, Hokkien, Hakka, and aboriginal languages
• Main foreign languages: English, Japanese
• Currency: New Taiwan Dollar (TWD)
• Time zone: National Standard Time (UTC+8), no daylight saving time
• Universal voltage: 110V, 60HZ

Geographical environment

Location
Taiwan is located in the arc of East Asian islands on the southeastern part of the Asian continent and on the west coast of the Pacific Ocean. It borders Japan and the Ryukyu Islands in the north, the Philippine Islands in the south, and mainland China to the west. Taiwan Island is about 395 kilometers long from north to south, with a maximum width of about 144 kilometers from east to west, covering an area of ​​about 36,000 square kilometers (about 14,400 square miles).

Terrain
The whole island of Taiwan has high mountains and high altitude changes. Most of the mountains are north-north-east to south-southwest. The highest peak is the main peak of Yushan in the Yushan Mountain Range. The highest peak in Northeast Asia is 3,952 meters above sea level. Due to the vast mountain area, Taiwan is naturally natural. Ecological resources are also quite abundant. Taiwan's flatness principle is relatively narrow, with only a small amount of plains in the rift valleys in the western and eastern regions, and most of them are densely populated areas.

Climate
Taiwan belongs to a tropical and subtropical climate zone. From rainy to dry weather and hot to cool temperature, it depends on altitude and latitude.

The average temperature in the northern half is about 21.7℃, and the average temperature in the southern half is about 24.1℃. Taiwan is the coldest from January to March, with the lowest temperature of about 10 degrees Celsius. From June to August, the climate is hot with the highest temperature of about 38 degrees Celsius. In other months, the temperature is moderate, with an average temperature of 25 degrees Celsius.

Taiwan's average annual rainfall is 2515 mm

Traffic
International airport

• Taoyuan International Airport
• Taipei Songshan Airport

Land Transportation
• Taiwan High Speed ​​Rail
• Taiwan Railway
• Taipei MRT
• Airport MRT

People
Ethnic group
Taiwan has a population of more than 23 million people. It can be divided into indigenous peoples who have been active in Taiwan for about 8,000 years, accounting for about 2.30% of the total population, and the rest are the Han people who moved in after the 17th century. Because of the integration of different ethnic groups, Taiwan's colorful humanities have been formed. Regardless of religious beliefs, architecture, language, living habits, and food flavors, it shows a diverse scene of harmony and co-prosperity everywhere. More than 70% of Taiwan’s population is concentrated in the five western metropolitan areas (Taipei, Taoyuan, Taichung, Tainan, and Kaohsiung), the largest of which is the Taipei Metropolitan Area, where the capital Taipei City and the largest city, New Taipei City are located.

Language
The new immigrants who moved to Taiwan with the government broadcast in 1949 belonged to various provinces and regions, and their languages ​​were complex, but they were generally able to communicate in Mandarin. They were called "Chinese" overseas. With the popularization of education, Mandarin has become the common language of all ethnic groups in Taiwan.

The Taiwanese ethnic group is mostly Hokkien, so there are many residents who can speak Hokkien (Fu Lao). The small number of Hakkas and the aborigines of various ethnic groups also retain their own language. Since Taiwan has been under Japanese colonial rule for half a century, many of the older generation of residents who received Japanese education before the restoration can speak a little Japanese.

Economic
After the 1960s, Taiwan carried out economic and industrial reforms, and its social development progressed by leaps and bounds. The economic achievements of the 1970s and 1980s have been ranked among the four dragons in Asia, and they have been among the developed countries in the 1990s.

Since the 1980s, Taiwan’s economic structure has gradually shifted from a labor-intensive industry to a high-tech industry. The electronics industry is even more important to the world economy. It has excellent performance in semiconductor, optoelectronics, information technology, communications, and electronic precision manufacturing. It shows that the economy at this stage is developing towards nanotechnology, biotechnology, optoelectronics and tourism services.

In addition, international trade is the lifeblood of Taiwan’s economy. Japan and the United States have long been Taiwan’s top two trading partners. Until 2005, China became Taiwan’s largest import and export trade region, while Japan and the United States ranked second and third.

In recent years, due to the severe financial situation of European and American countries and the slowdown of economic growth in Mainland China, Taiwan’s economic performance has been jointly affected. In 2013, Taiwan’s economic growth rate was 2.11%, gross domestic product (GDP) was US$489,132 million, gross national income (GNP) was US$503,264 million, and the average GNP per capita was US$20,952. In terms of prices, in 2014 In October, the consumer price index rose by 1.07% from the same period last year. As for employment, the average number of employed persons in January 2017 was 11.099 million, and the unemployment rate was 3.96%.


For more information about Taiwan , please refer to About Taiwan .