Ningbo

Tianfeng Tower, originally built during the Tang Dynasty, is the symbol of old Ningbo.

A rock garden inside Tianyi Chamber

Since the Tang dynasty Ningbo has been an important commercial port. Arab traders lived in Ningbo during the Song dynasty when it was known as Mingzhou,[4] as the ocean-going trade passages took precedence over land trade during this time.[5][6] Another name for Mingzhou/Ningbo was Siming. It was a well known center of ocean-going commerce with the foreign world.[7] These merchants did not intermingle with native Chinese, instead practicing their own customs and religion and inhabiting ghettos. They did not try to proselytize Islam to the Chinese.[8] Jews also lived in Ningbo, as evidenced by the fact that, after a major flood destroyed Torah scrolls in Kaifeng in 1642, a replacement was sent to the Kaifeng Jews by the Ningbo Jewish community.[9]

The city of Ningbo was known in Europe for a long time under the name of Liampó. This is the usual spelling used e.g. in the standard Portuguese history, João de Barros's Décadas da Ásia, although Barros explained that Liampó was a Portuguese "corruption" of the more correct Nimpó.[10][11] The spelling Liampó is also attested in the Peregrination (Peregrinação) by Fernão Mendes Pinto, a (so-called) autobiography written in Portuguese during the 16th century. For the mid-16th-century Portuguese, the nearby promontory, which they called the cape of Liampó, after the nearby "illustrious city" was the easternmost known point of the mainland Asia.[10] The Portuguese began trading in Ningbo around 1522. By 1542, the Portuguese had a sizable community in Ningbo (or, more likely, on nearby small islands such as Shuangyu). Portuguese activities from their Ningbo base included pillaging and attacking multiple Chinese port cities around Ningbo for plunder and spoil. They also enslaved people during their raids.[12] The Portuguese were ousted from the Ningbo area in 1548.

Ningbo was one of the five Chinese treaty ports opened by the Treaty of Nanjing (signed in 1842) at the end of the First Opium War between Britain and China. During the war, British forces briefly took possession of the walled city of Ningbo after storming the fortified town of Zhenhai at the mouth of the Yong River on October 10, 1841. The British subsequently repulsed a Chinese attempt to retake the city in the Battle of Ningpo on March 10, 1842. In 1861, the forces of the Taiping Rebellion took the city relatively unopposed as the defending garrison fled; they held the town for six months.[13] In March 1885, during the Sino-French War, Admiral Courbet's naval squadron blockaded several Chinese warships in Zhenhai Bay and exchanged fire with the shore defenses.

Ningbo was also once famed for traditional Chinese furniture production. During the Qing dynasty, western encyclopedias described Ningbo as a center of craftsmanship and industry.[14][15]

During the late Qing dynasty, in the 1800s, the Ningbo authorities contracted Cantonese pirates to exterminate and massacre Portuguese pirates who had raided Cantonese shipping around Ningbo. The massacre was "successful", with 40 Portuguese dead and only 2 Chinese dead, being dubbed "The Ningpo Massacre" by an English correspondent, who noted that the Portuguese pirates had behaved savagely towards the Chinese, and that the Portuguese authorities at Macau should have reined in the pirates.

Map of Ningbo (19th century)[4]

During late Qing era, Western missionaries set up a Presbyterian Church in Ningbo. Li Veng-eing was a Reverend of the Ningpo Church.[16] The Ningpo College was managed by Rev. Robert F. Fitch. The four trustees were natives of Ningbo, three of them had Taotai rank.[17] Rev. George Evans Moule, B. A. was appointed a missionary to China by the Church of England Missionary Society, and arrived at Ningpo with Mrs. Moule in February 1858. He then began a mission station at Hang-chow, between which and Ningpo his time had been chiefly divided. He wrote Christian publications in the Ningbo dialect.[18]

During World War II in 1940, Japan bombed Ningbo with ceramic bombs full of fleas carrying the bubonic plague.[19] According to Daniel Barenblatt, Prince Tsuneyoshi Takeda received, with Prince Mikasa, a special screening by Shiro Ishii of a film showing imperial planes loading germ bombs for bubonic dissemination over Ningbo in 1940.[20]

"It has been said of the Ningbo fishermen that, 'no people in the world apparently made so great an advance in the art of fishing; and for centuries past no people have made so little further progress.'"[21]

Between 80% to 90% of Ningbo's population fled the city during the Japanese invasion.[22]

Ningbo has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cfa) with four distinctive seasons, characterized by hot, humid summers and chilly, cloudy and dry winters (with occasional snow). The mean annual temperature is 17.15 °C (62.9 °F), with monthly daily averages ranging from 5.3 °C (41.5 °F) in January to 28.8 °C (83.8 °F) in July. Extremes since 1951 have ranged from −8.8 °C (16 °F) on 12 January 1955 to 42.1 °C (108 °F) on 8 August 2013.[23] The city receives an average annual rainfall of 1,430 mm (56 in) and is affected by the plum rains of the Asian monsoon in June, when average relative humidity also peaks. From August to October, Ningbo experiences the effects of typhoons, and is affected by an average 1.8 storms annually, though the city is not often struck directly by these systems. A 2012 OECD study lists Ningbo among the top 20 cities worldwide most at risk of flooding due to anthropogenic climate change.[24]

With several important development zones established in or around Ningbo, the city has received considerable foreign investment.[35] Over 60 domestic and foreign-invested financial institutions have established operations in the city, which has also attracted more than 10,000 foreigners. The municipal government offers preferential policies designed to encourage investment in international trade, new strategic industries, manufacturing, information services, and creative industries.[32]

Located in the north-east of Ningbo, behind Beilun Port, NETD is 27 km (17 mi) away from the city center. With more than 20 years of great effort, NETD has already formed the general framework for large scale construction and development, and established the perfect investment environment. It is situated close to the Ningbo Port and Ningbo Lishe International Airport. Major Investors include Exxon Mobile, Dupont and Dow Chemical.[36]

The Ningbo Daxie Development Zone was approved in 1993 and covers an area of 5.92 km² (2.29 sq mi). Over more than ten years of development and construction, industrial and logistical foundations have been established in the zone for the transshipment of energy, liquid chemicals and containers.[36]

Ningbo National Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone was founded in 1999 and was upgraded to a national level zone in January 2007. It is 10 km (6.2 mi) from Ningbo International Airport and 18 km (11 mi) away from Ningbo Port. The zone serves as the important technical innovation base of Yangtze River Delta. Industries encouraged include chemicals production and processing, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, raw material processing, Research and Development.[37]

Ningbo Free Trade Zone is one of the 15 free trade zones authorized by the State Council of China, and is the only free trade zone in Zhejiang Province. It was established by State Council in 1992, covering the area of 2.3 km² (0.89 sq mi). It lies in the middle of the coastline of Mainland China, at the south of Yangtze River Delta. In 2008, its industrial output value was RMB 53.33 billion and grew at 19.8% as compared to 2007.[38]

The Nordic Industrial Park Co. Ltd. (NIP) is one of the first wholly foreign-owned industrial parks in China located in Ningbo, Zhejiang Province. NIP is managed and operated by a Scandinavian management team.[39]

The Ningbo Advertising Park is a national level pilot park located in the Ningbo Southern Business District. The financial incentives have attracted over 300 relevant firms to establish operations.[40]

As there are three main rivers running through Ningbo, it is crucial to build bridges to improve the efficiency of the transport network in Ningbo. The Ling Bridge which connects Haishu district and Jiangdong District is the earliest modern bridge built in Ningbo, designed by German engineers. Since the late 1980s, 16 bridges have been built on the three rivers. Currently another 27 bridges are under construction.

The Hangzhou Bay Bridge, a combination cable-stayed bridge and causeway across Hangzhou Bay, opened to the public on May 1, 2008. This bridge connects the municipalities of Shanghai and Ningbo, and is considered the longest trans-oceanic bridge in the world. It is the world's second-longest bridge, after the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway in Louisiana, United States.

The Jintang Bridge, a 4 lane sea crossing bridge linking Jintang Island of Zhoushan and Zhenhai district, is a 27 km (17 mi) long opened on December 26, 2009.

The Xiangshan Harbor Bridge opened to traffic on December 29, 2012, connecting Ningbo with Xiangshan. The 47 km (29 mi)long project includes 22 km (14 mi) as the main body of the bridge and a 8 kilometer-long tunnel.[45]

The port of Ningo is one of the world's busiest ports. It was ranked number 7 in total Cargo Volume and number 6 in total container traffic in 2011.[46]

Ningbo Lishe International Airport connects Ningbo by air to the rest of China, with regularly scheduled domestic and international flights. In 2009, new air routes between Ningbo and Taiwan were opened. Jetstar Asia launched a new route between Ningbo and Singapore in September 2011. Tiger Air planned to begin flying this route from 26 December 2013.

Three railway lines intersect in Ningbo: the Xiaoshan–Ningbo Railway (Xiaoyong Line), which runs west to Hangzhou, the Ningbo–Taizhou–Wenzhou (Yongtaiwen) Railway, which runs south to Wenzhou, and the Hangzhou–Ningbo High-Speed Railway, which runs parallel to the Xiaoyong Line providing high-speed railway service.

With the booming economy in the region, the Xiaoyong Railway, a conventional railway built in the 1950s, could not meet the demand for railway travel between Zhejiang's two largest cities, so construction of a new high-speed railway line between Hangzhou and Ningbo started in 2009. The new railway line was finished by 2013 and reduced travel time between Ningbo and Hangzhou to 50 minutes.

The Ningbo–Taizhou–Wenzhou Railway is a high-speed railway that opened in September 2009. It connects Ningbo with cities along the coast to the south to Fujian Province. High-speed trains on this line operate at speeds of up to 250 km/h (160 mph).

Ningbo re-opened the Ningbo railway station after three years of construction on December 28, 2013. With a construction area of more than 120,000 m2,[47] it is one of the largest railway stations in China.

Seven expressways connect Ningbo with its surrounding cities:

• The Hangyong expressway, built in the 1990s, connects Hangzhou and Ningbo, now part of Hangzhou Bay ring expressway (G9211).
• The Yongtaiwen expressway (G15), opened in 2000, connects Ningbo with Taizhou and Wenzhou.
• The Yongjin expressway (G1512) connects Ningbo and Jinhua.
• The Huyong expressway (G15) connects Ningbo and Shanghai via the Hangzhou Bay bridge.
• The Yongzhou expressway (G9211) via Jintang Bridge.[48]
• The G1501 Ningbo Ring Expressway
• The G15W2 Ningbo–Dongguan Expressway

Line 1 train leaving Xujiacao Changle Station

Ningbo has two metro lines in service consisting of Line 1, which is 46.2 kilometers in length and has 29 stations, and Line 2, which is 28.4 kilometers in length and has 22 stations. More lines are under construction. Line 3 is scheduled to be finished in the year 2019 and Line 4 in 2020. Future plans are for 7 metro lines serving Ningbo.

Ningbo speech is a dialect of Wu Chinese that has preserved many aspects of ancient Chinese phonology. Its original wording mode can be found in classical reference books. It can be found that the trisyllable and tetrasyllable phrases or proverbs in Ningbo dialect make it most unusual and dynamic. Moreover, the onomatopoeia, assonance words, collocations, inversions, and other language characteristics within Ningbo dialect all add spice to people's life. After the unequal treaty port opening, western culture gradually permeated Ningbo. Thus the prefix "洋 yang" before the nouns of imported goods is a special language phenomenon of Ningbo dialect.[49]

Ningbo is known for Ningbo Tangyuan, small stuffed buns which are boiled. The stuffing is usually ground sesame mixed with sugar. It can also be mixed with pork fat. The stuffing is wrapped with sticky rice powder. Even more so, Ningbo is famous throughout China for its seafood. Seafood markets are abundant, carrying countless varieties of fish, crabs/lobsters/shrimp, shellfish, snails, jellyfish and other invertebrates, and sea vegetables in all stages of preparation from "still swimming," to cleaned and ready to cook, to fully cooked.

Ningbo has many traditional Han Chinese festivals same as other provinces in China. However, the date of Mid-Autumn Festival is different from others. Han Chinese will have Mid-Autumn Festival on Lunar Calendar August 15, but Ningbo will have on August 16th. The most creditable history for this is that long ago, the whole city waited for Shih Hao, a Southern Sung prime minister.

Ningbo has 16 colleges and universities. University of Nottingham Ningbo China is China's very first Sino-Foreign University – a joint venture between the University of Nottingham and the Wanli Education Group. UNNC has built a very high reputation in China for the quality of its undergraduate education and graduated its first PhD students in 2013.[52] Toward the north of the city is Ningbo University, while the Ningbo Higher Education Zone (Yinzhou district) is home to Zhejiang Wanli University, affiliated to Zhejiang University, Ningbo Institute of Technology, Zhejiang University, which was ranked as the eleventh best of independent colleges in China in 2011,[53] is also in this education zone.

Compulsory education (basic education in Chinese terms) is from the ages 6 to 15. Students are catered to in a variety of state and private schools. Studying for the gaokao(高考), a test of a student's skill, is optional.[54]

Several schools are permitted to operate foreign educational programs as an alternative to the Chinese National curriculum and accept international students.

Access International Academy Ningbo (AIAN) and Ningbo Zhicheng School International (NZSI) both offer the American AERO (American Education Reaches Out) curriculum with the College Board Advanced Placement examinations. Ningbo International School (NBIS) delivers the Cambridge International Primary and Secondary Curricula leading to iGCSE Examinations and A-Levels. Huamao Multicultural Education Academy[55] is an IB World School and offers an international curriculum through the IB Primary Years Program for students ages 3–12 and the IB Diploma Program for students ages 16–19.