With its vast mountainous regions--high in the west and low in the east--China has a varied topography and diverse physical features. Plains are mainly in the east; in the southeast are mainly hills; plateaus and basins join the other topographical forms scattered over wide areas or intermingling with each other to provide favorable conditions for developing a diversified economy of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and mining. The proportion of plains, hills, mountains, plateaus and basins in the country?s total area is 12,10,33,26 and 19 percent respectively.

The land surface of China slopes down from west to east in a three-step staircase.

The top of the staircase, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in southwestern China, known as ? the roof of the world?, is composed of high and super-high mountains and massive highlands and averages 4,000 meters or more above sea level. Mount Qomolangma, the world?s highest, is situated on the southern rim of the plateau, on the Sino-Nepalese border.

The second step of the staircase Going north from the Qinghai-Tibet plateau across the Kunlun and Qilan ranges and east across the Hengduan Mountains, the land abruptly drops to plateaus, mountains and basins on an altitude of 2,000 to 1,000 meters, forming the second step down the staircase, which consists of the Yunnan-Guizhou, Loess and Inner Mongolia plateaus and the Tarim , Junggar and Sichuan basins.

The third step of the staircase The bulk of China?s population lives in the third or lowest step down the staircase, east of the line from the Greater Hinggan, Taihang and Wushan ranges and eastern rim of the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau to the sea coast. Here are hills less than 1,00 meters and plains less than 200 meters in elevation. Lying from north to south are the Northeast Plain, the North China Plain, the Middle-Lower Changjiang (Yangtze River) Plain and the hills and foothills south of the Yangtze River. With superior geographical conditions and a large concentration of big cities, these are the leading farming and industrial areas of China.

To the east of the thired step is the continental shelf formed by the shallows, which are an extension of the land into the ocean.

(china.org.cn)