Hubei’s mineral wealth consists chiefly of iron, copper, and phosphorus ores; coal; and gypsum. Some of China’s richest and best iron ore is found at Daye in southeastern Hubei. The exploitation of this ore and of coking coal from Pingxiang in Jiangxi was the basis for the founding of an ironworks at Hanyang at the end of the 19th century. Ore from Daye and other mines was also the basis for the establishment of the Wuhan Iron and Steel Corporation, one of China’s largest integrated ironworks. Copper is found at Yangxin in the east and also at Daye. Reserves are large compared to those of other provinces, and production has increased considerably. Bituminous coal is found in the west and anthracite (hard coal) in the south and east. There are large reserves of gypsum and salt in the northeast

Construction began in 1994 on the enormous Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River at Sandouping, some 25 miles (40 km) upstream of Yichang. The project was designed to provide water conservation, flood control, and hydroelectric power for the regions downstream of the dam. The dam wall itself was completed in 2006, and it has since impounded an enormous reservoir that stretches upstream well into Chongqing municipality. The dam’s hydroelectric station has an installed capacity of 22,500 megawatts. The first turbines began generating electricity in 2003, and the hydroelectric station reached full generating capacity in 2012. Power is now distributed eastward to Hubei and several adjacent provinces, and transmission lines reach Shanghai on the East China Sea coast.

Manufacturing

After 1949, when Wuhan was restored to its traditional role as a national centre of trade and transportation, the tri-city area came to play an important role in the province’s economic development. In 1983 the conurbation was given economic power on a level with the provincial government. The Wuhan Iron and Steel Corporation plant, completed in 1961, was followed by other large iron and steel works in the area, as well as by a wide variety of other heavy and light industries. Wuhan is now one of the most important industrial centres in China. Huangshi has also developed as a large iron and steel centre. Shiyan, in northwestern Hubei, as well as Xianfan and Wuhan to the southeast, collectively have become a major national hub of the automotive industry. In addition, the Wuchang district in Wuhan has a large shipyard, and a number of foreign-built plants in the province produce chemical fertilizers.

Transportation

For more than 2,000 years waterways have been the main means of communication in Hubei. Wuhan, known historically as “the thoroughfare of nine provinces,” is the largest inland port in the country. The Yangtze and Han rivers, with their tributaries, are used by all manner of craft. Until the completion of the Three Gorges Dam, large oceangoing freighters could reach only to Hankou, above which smaller craft could penetrate much farther inland. However, the dam makes possible navigation by large ships up to Yichang, and locks near the dam facilitate access to the reservoir and allow navigation all the way to Chongqing. Huge coaster junks from Zhejiang and Fujian provinces also sail up and down the Yangtze, and the small stern-oared huazi—each rowed from the stern by one man—ply the smaller streams. In addition to the rivers, the lake plain is a network of drainage channels that are used for communication by the local people.

Until 1957 Hubei’s railways consisted entirely of the Beijing-Hankou (Wuhan) and Wuchang-Guangzhou (Canton) line, which ran from north to south across the province. Because of political unrest, corruption, and lack of funds, by 1949 the Beijing-Hankou line was in a parlous state; rapid repair work was carried out by the communist government. In 1957 the completion of the bridge over the Yangtze between Hanyang and Wuchang—the first bridging of the river over its entire length—wrought a revolution in the system by greatly increasing the value and efficiency of the whole north-south line from Beijing to Guangzhou.

More than half of the pre-1949 road network was rendered unusable by the Sino-Japanese War (1937–45) and subsequent civil war. Since 1949, much reconstruction and repair work has been done, and new roads have been built. Wuhan is a locus for major north-south and east-west express highways.

Wuhan also has become an important national centre for international and domestic air traffic. Air services, formerly entirely under central government control, have been supplemented by a number of regional carriers, as well as by foreign ones. Several other cities also provide domestic air service, including Xiangfan and Yichang.

Constitutional framework

From 1950 to 1954 Hubei was part of the Central South greater administrative region. In 1954 provincial government was established directly under the central government. In 1958 local government was greatly modified by the formation of communes, which took over the duties of the rural districts and market towns (xiang and zhen) and were made responsible for the functioning of all local life at this level. During the early years of the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) Hubei was governed by a Revolutionary Committee composed of party cadres, the army, and the revolutionary mass organizations. The Revolutionary Committee was replaced in 1980 by the People’s Government, which is the administrative arm of the People’s Congress. The commune system was abolished in the 1980s, and the township government pattern of the 1950s was reestablished. Hubei is now divided administratively into 12 prefecture-level municipalities (dijishi) and one autonomous prefecture (zizhizhou). Below that level are districts under the municipality (shixiaqu), counties (xian), autonomous counties (zizhixian), county-level municipalities (xianjishi), and one forest region (shengnongjia linqu).

Health and welfare

Before 1949 there were large, efficient modern hospitals, run by Christian missions and secular bodies in both Hankou and Wuchang; good though many were, they were inadequate to meet the needs of the rural people. Insofar as rural needs were met at all, they were served by medical missionaries and nurses, scattered sparsely throughout the province, as well as by Chinese doctors, herbalists, and acupuncturists. From the 1950s the city hospital services were greatly enlarged, offering a choice of Western or Chinese medicine; however, most attention has been paid to public health and to preventive medicine. Debilitating diseases such as schistosomiasis (a parasitic disease) and malaria were attacked; drinking water and the proper disposal of sewage were supervised; standards of personal hygiene and of the cleanliness of streets and public places were raised. These measures, and the equitable distribution of food, have served to improve health and increase production.