Shandong (East of the Mountains) takes its name from the fact that it lies to the east of the Taihang range. It is situated on the eastern coast of China, in the lower Huanghe River valley. The Shahdong Peninsula in the east protrudes between the Bohai and Huanghai seas from the land mass and faces the Liaodong Peninsula in the north across the Bohai Straits, forming the maritime outpost of the nation's capital, Beijing. The province has an area of more than 150,000 square kilometers and a population of 72.96 million, of which 86 per cent live in the rural areas and 14 per cent in the cities. Shandong's mainland coastline totals 3,000 kilometers. The province has a warm temperate monsoon climate with most rainfall concentrated in the hot summer. It has short spring and autumn but long winter and summer. The mean temperatures in a year are 11-14 °C. The annual average rainfall is between 550-950 mm. Natural calamities occur often.

In 2004, The GDP of Shandong Province was 1549.07 billion yuan, up 15.3% from the previous year.The primary industry yielded a value added of 177.83 billion yuan, up 6.9% from the previous year; the secondary industry, 872.45 billion yuan, a growth of 19.2%; the tertiary industry, 498.79 billion yuan, a growth of 12.3%.Provincial revenue was 267.56 billion yuan, an increase of 26.1% over the previous year. Provincial expenditure was 118.86 billion yuan, a growth of 17.6%.CPI was up 3.6% from the previous year.Fixed asset investment was valued at 758.93 billion yuan, up 37.7% from the previous year.

Major industries of Shandong Province are agriculture, the total agricultural output value was 190.25 billion yuan, up 6.5% from the previous year; industry, the industrial added value totaled 649.83 billion yuan, an increase of 26.5%; high-tech, the investment in high-tech industries totaled 46.37 billion yuan in 2004, up 51.4% from the year before, the total added value from these industries for the year stood at 125.11 billion yuan, up 29.3%, the output value of high-tech industries accounted for 21.9% of the province's total industrial output value; construction, its added value was 190.21 billion yuan, up 28.4%; transportation, the annual volume of goods handled by various modes of transportation was 1.32 billion tons, up 10.2%, while annual passenger flow reached 890 million, up 18.4%; postal services, the annual turnover of postal operations totaled 3.94 billion yuan, 9.6% up from the previous year; telecommunications, the annual turnover of telecom services was 48.46 billion yuan, up 45.0%; retail, the annual turnover from retail sales reached 448.34 billion yuan, an increase of 13.9% from the previous year; tourism, revenue from tourism stood at 81.47 billion yuan, up 42.1%;

In 2004, the annual value of imports and exports totaled US$60.78 billion, an increase of 36.1% from the previous year. overseas project and labor contracts signed during the year were valued at US$1.47 billion, up 18.0%. Business turnover for the year totaled US$1.52 billion, an increase of 52.8% from the previous year. A total of 63,000 laborers were working outstation at the year-end. The foreign direct investment realized in monetary terms was US$9.82 billion, up 32.4%.

Investment in urban road construction totaled 40.75 billion yuan, up 27.4% from the 2003 figure. By the end of 2004, 3,033 km of express highway had been open to traffic, and 112 km of the Dajiawa-Laizhou-Longkou railway line had been completed and open to traffic.The daily capacity of tap water supply reached 400,000 tons, the daily capacity of sewage treatment reached 440,000 tons, and the daily capacity of garbage treatment reached 2,000 tons at the end of 2004. A population of 600,000 now has access to liquefied gas.

At the end of 2004, 17,000 technological trading agencies in the province employed 210,000 people. A total of 26,000 technological contracts were signed during the year, 7.3% up from 2003. The contractual value amounted to 7.51 billion yuan, up 42.8%.The number of students enrolled in postgraduate schools and institutions of higher learning during the year stood at 11,000 and 327,000 respectively. In addition, the province has 139 schools for the handicapped and 798 vocational schools.Shandong had a total of 120 professional performing organizations, 157 cultural and arts centers, 140 public libraries, and 158 archives.There were a total of 17,000 medical and healthcare institutions equipped with 222,000 beds and staffed with some 321,000 medical professionals and technicians at the year-end. The year saw the investment of more than 90 million yuan in the national physical fitness campaign.1,896 welfare units across the province were equipped with 103,000 beds and put up 79,000 vagrant and homeless people during the year. There were also 2,012 welfare enterprises which employed 46,000 handicapped people. About 1.116 million people received minimum living allowances from the government. More than 100,000 students from poor families got financial assistance from the government.

Mainly relying on rainfall, the province's water resource is in scarcity, with only 520 cubic meters of water available for each of its residents, accounting for 18.8% of the national average of 2,770 cubic meters per head. For the time being, the water-supply ability of the province is 19.224 billion cubic meters, including 7.844 billion cubic meters of surface water, 5.88 billion cubic meters of underground water and 5.5 billion cubic meters diverted from the Yellow River.

A total of 128 varieties of minerals, 78% of that found in China, have been discovered in the province, of which 33 have their surveyed deposits listed among the top tens of the nation: gold, natural sulphur and gypsum rank the first; petroleum, diamond, magnesite, cobalt, hafnium, and granite are the second; and kali salt, graphite, talc, bentonite, and limestone are the third. In addition, the reserves of many other minerals, such as natural gas, iron, barite, diatomite, zircon, bauxite, and refractory clay are also very affluent.

There are more than 3,100 varieties of plant, including 645 of wide cash, growing in the province. Among the 450 species of wild land vertebrate animals (accounting for 21 percent of the nation's total), 55 are beasts, 362 are birds, eight are amphibians and 25 are reptiles. In addition, there are many species of land invertebrates, insects in particular, making the province rank No. 1 in the country in varieties of creatures in this category.

One ofChina's major agricultural production bases, Shandong is known as "a warehouse of grains, cotton, and oil, and the land of fruits and aquatic products." It's also an important producer of wheat, cotton, peanut, tobacco, hemp, silkworms, traditional Chinese medicinal herbs and materials. The apples produced in Yantai, pears from Laiyang, peaches of Feicheng, and Leling's golden-threaded jujubes are all famous specialties.

Shandong is rich in marine resources too. Its offshore area makes up 37% of the total surface area of the Bohai and Yellow seas, with a shoal area accounting for 15% of the nation's total. There are about 260 species of fish and prawn in its seas, including more than 40 major cash species of fish and 100 species of shellfish. Shandong leads the country in the production of prawns, shellfishes, abalones, sea slugs and urchins. Meanwhile, with many large and medium-sized salt works, the province is also one of China's four major salt producers. In its 266,000 ha of freshwaters, there are more than 40 species of freshwater plants and more than 70 species of fish.

The province is one ofChina's important energy bases, with Shengli Oilfield being the second largest of its kind in the country, and Zhongyuan, another oilfield, having a major part on its territory. The crude oil produced in Shandong makes up one-third of the nation's total. The province has 50,000 sq km of coalfields and its Yanteng Coalmine is one of the nation's 10 major coal production bases. The province has a rich electricity resource. The Shandong power network is the only one of the country's six major power networks that is operated separately on a provincial basis.

With beautiful natural landscapes and numerous historical and cultural relics, Shandong has rich tourist resources. It offers a string of tourist attractions, such as Mount Taishan and the Temple, Mansion and Cemetery of Confucius, two World Heritage sites; Lingzi, capital of the ancient Qi State; Penglai, the well known "fairyland on earth"; Mount Laoshan, a sacred land of Taoism; Weifang, the "world capital of kites"; Qingdao, a charming coastal city famous for its annual International Beer Fair; Yantai, known worldwide as a wine producer; Rongcheng, a place considered as "the edge of the world" by ancient Chinese; Jinan, the provincial capital honored as "the city of springs"; and the site for watching the wonderful scene of the torrential Yellow River running into the sea.

In November 1998, Shandong Province established sistership relations with Western Cape Province.