National Economic Atlas of the People's Republic of China
中华人民共和国国家经济地图集
China · 中国地图出版社 · 1993
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"Introduction to 'The National Economic Atlas of China and Its Electronic Edition'"
Unknown · 1996
The *National Economic Atlas of the People's Republic of China* and its electronic edition represent a major national scientific reference project, jointly led by the State Planning Commission and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, with the Institute of Geography as chief editor. Launched in 1987 and published in Chinese (1993) and English (1994), the atlas contains 10 thematic sections, 265 maps, and 250,000 words of explanatory text, comprehensively covering resources, population, overall economy, agriculture, industry, transportation, construction, urban development, environmental protection, commerce, foreign trade, tourism, finance, education, science, culture, health, and provincial economies. The compilation method combines high-level synthesis with in-depth analysis, employing innovative indicator classification, grading systems, and multi-level cartographic units to systematically depict China's independent national economic and industrial system—its scale, structure, spatial patterns, regional disparities, and the decisive roles of resources and population. An expert appraisal committee certified the atlas as having attained internationally advanced standards. Professor D.R.F. Taylor, then ICA President, described it as one of the most comprehensive and detailed economic atlases ever produced and an outstanding contribution to understanding China's socio‑economic development. The electronic version, developed on the self‑developed EA‑World platform with the latest data, offers strong visualization, ease of operation, and robust comparative analysis, and was acclaimed as a world‑leading electronic atlas masterpiece and “a pearl of China’s information industry.” The atlas has become an authoritative tool for macro‑decision‑making, academic research, and international investment, exerting a profound and lasting impact.
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Introduction to the National Economic Atlas of China
Taylor, D. R. F. · 1993
This paper presents the compilation of the *National Economic Atlas of China* and establishes an imagery transformation model for map compilation. The atlas integrates large-scale, high-quality data from the 1985–1986 Industrial Census and the Fourth Population Census, using over 500 socio-economic variables and 265 maps with counties and cities as the basic geographical units. It systematically reveals China’s socio-economic spatial patterns, highlighting striking regional disparities and the eastward shift of the economic center of gravity. Rigorous data quality assessments demonstrate extremely low error rates, with overall industrial census errors at 0.102% and only 0.06% net undercount in the population census. To raise the map compilation process to a theoretical level of imagery processing, a model of four sequential imagery transformations is proposed: from basic source materials to photographic negatives, from negatives to blueprints, from blueprints to compilation bases, and from compilation bases to final compilation originals. This model abstracts traditional cartographic procedures into an imagery processing framework, facilitating computer-aided interactive editing and large-database management. The atlas is recognized as a monumental achievement, both as a comprehensive cartographic portrait of the world’s most populous country and as a significant contribution to understanding contemporary socio-economic transformations. The imagery transformation model further provides a theoretical basis for advancing computer-assisted cartography.
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