About two thirds of the population in western China's Chongqing municipality lived in countryside eight years ago, but the ratio has reduced to 55 percent, implying that at least 3.6 million people completed their rural-urban migration.

Since detaching from Sichuan Province on June 18, 1997, and becoming China's fourth largest municipality, Chongqing has tried to change its old image as a big city together with a large-scale countryside, and cities have emerged in groups at the speed of 20 to 25 square kilometers of enlargement per year.

In China's West Development strategy, the rise of Chongqing's cities is not the only success. In other western China regions, cities grouping around Chengdu and Xi'an are growing and have become industrial centers which have promoted the local economy.

With broad and lean land, China's west has lagged behind the coastal economy.

Chengdu, Xi'an, Lanzhou, Nanning, and Kunming, all cities in the west, have also formed their own city groups.

Chen Deming, Shaanxi provincial governor, explained that the structure of west city groups are helpful in ameliorating such problems in single big cities as traffic jams, pollution and soaring housing prices.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences has set 45 core cities in west China as the main pillars for local economic development.

With Shanghai at its core, the city group in the Yangtze River Delta region has become the engine of China's economy.

Experts hold that the overall development of city groups in western China is will help achieve regional economic integration and realize social equality and harmonious development. 

(China Daily October 11, 2005)