Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture

Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, also known as Aba (Tibetan: རྔ་བ་བོད་རིགས་དང་ཆང་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ།, Wylie: rnga ba bod rigs cha'ang rigs rang skyong khul; Qiang: Rrmeabba Shbea Rrmea Nyujwju Gvexueaj Legea; simplified Chinese: 阿坝藏族羌族自治州; traditional Chinese: 阿壩藏族羌族自治州), is an autonomous prefecture of northwestern Sichuan, bordering Gansu to the north and northeast and Qinghai to the northwest. Its seat is in Barkam, and it has an area of 83,201 km² (32,124 sq mi). The population was 895,200 by 2022.^[2]

Aba Prefecture 阿坝州 · རྔ་བ་ཁུལ། · Rrmeabba Legea
Autonomous prefecture
阿坝藏族羌族自治州 · རྔ་བ་བོད་རིགས་ཆ་བ༹ང་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ། · Rrmeabba Shbea Rrmea Nyujwju Gvexueaj Legea Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture
Jiuzhaigou National Park
Ngawa-Qiang Autonomous Prefecture (top centre) in Sichuan
Coordinates (Ngawa Prefecture government): 31.90°N 102.22°E / 31.90; 102.22
Country	China
Province	Sichuan
Prefecture seat	Barkam (Barkam Town)
Government
• Type	Autonomous prefecture
• CCP Secretary	Xu Zhivin
• Congress Chairman	Luo Zhenhua
• Governor	Yang Kening
• CPPCC Chairman	Nyima Mu
Area
• Total	83,201 km2 (32,124 sq mi)
Population  (2022)
• Total	895,200
• Density	11/km2 (28/sq mi)
• Major Ethnic Groups	Tibetan−60.2% Han−18.0% Qiang- 18.5% Hui−3.1%
GDP[1]
• Total	CN¥ 26.5 billion US$ 4.3 billion
• Per capita	CN¥ 28,647 US$ 4,599
Time zone	UTC+08:00 (China Standard)
Area code	0837
ISO 3166 code	CN-SC-32
License Plate Prefix	川U
Website	Aba China

Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture
Chinese name
Simplified Chinese	阿坝藏族羌族自治州
Traditional Chinese	阿壩藏族羌族自治州
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Ābà Zàngzú Qiāngzú Zìzhìzhōu
Abbreviated as "Aba Prefecture"
Simplified Chinese	阿坝州
Traditional Chinese	阿壩州
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Ābà Zhōu
Tibetan name
Tibetan	རྔ་བ་བོད་རིགས་དང་ཆང་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ།
Transcriptions Wylie nga ba bod rigs dang chang rigs rang skyong khul Tibetan Pinyin Ngawa Poirig Qangrig Ranggyong Kü

The county of Wenchuan in Ngawa is the site of the epicenter of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, in which over 20,000 of its residents died and 40,000 were injured.

History and names

During the reign of Tibet's king Trisong Detsen in the 8th century, the Gyalrong area was visited by the great translator Vairotsana.

In 1410 Je Tsongkhapa's student Tshakho Ngawang Tapa established the first Tibetan Buddhist Gelug school monastery in the area, called "Gyalrong".

In contemporary history, most of Ngawa was under the 16th Administrative Prefecture of Szechwan (四川省第十六行政督察區), which was established by the Republic of China (ROC).^[3]

The People's Republic of China defeated ROC troops in this area during Chinese Civil war and subsequently established a Tibetan autonomous prefecture by late 1952. It was renamed Aba Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in 1956 and Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture in 1987.^[4]

On May 12, 2008, a major earthquake occurred in Wenchuan County (Tibetan: ལུང་དགུ་, Wylie: lung dgu), a county in the southeastern part of this autonomous prefecture. 20,258 people were killed, 45,079 injured, 7,696 missing in the prefecture as of June 6, 2008.^[5][6]

Geography

Most of the prefecture lies in the Tibetan cultural and historical region of Amdo. The west, and part of Kardze, is also known as Gyalrong. Gyalrong people speak a Qiangic language known as Gyalrong language. The source of the Min River and its tributary Dadu River are to be found in Ngawa.

Demographics

As of 2013^[update], the prefecture's population was 919,987 inhabitants at a density of 10.91 per km²:^[7]

Ethnic group	Population	Proportion of total
Tibetan	489,747	57.3%
Han	220,353	20.6%
Qiang	157,905	18.6%
Hui	26,353	3.3%
Yi	685	0.08%
Manchu	373	0.04%
Miao	266	0.03%
Mongols	202	0.02%
Tujia	182	0.02%
Bai	101	0.01%
Zhuang	95	0.01%
others	278	0.03%

Languages

Major languages spoken in Aba Prefecture include Tibetan, Mandarin Chinese and many vernaculars of the Qiangic languages which vary from county to county:

• Barkam: rGyalrong
• Li County: Southern Qiang, rGyalrong
• Mao County: Northern Qiang, Southern Qiang
• Jiuzhaigou County: Baima
• Jinchuan County: Khroskyabs, rGyalrong
• Xiaojin County: rGyalrong
• Heishui County: Northern Qiang, rGyalrong
• Zamtang County: Amdo Tibetan

In April 2020, classroom instruction was switched from Tibetan to Mandarin Chinese in Ngaba.^[8]

Administrative divisions

The region is composed of one county-level city and twelve counties:

Map Barkam (city) Wenchuan County Li County Mao County Songpan County Jiuzhaigou County Jinchuan County Xiaojin County Heishui County Zamtang County Ngawa County Zoigê County Hongyuan County
#	Name	Hanzi	Pinyin	Tibetan	Wylie	Qiang	Population (2010 Census)	Area (km2)	Density (/km2)
1	Barkam City (Ma'erkang City)	马尔康市	Mǎ'ěrkāng Shì	འབར་ཁམས་གྲོང་ཁྱེར།	'bar khams rdzong	Muerkvua shi	58,437	6,639	8.80
2	Wenchuan County	汶川县	Wènchuān Xiàn	ལུང་དགུ་རྫོང་། / ཁྲི་ཚང་རྫོང་།	lung dgu rdzong / khri tshang rdzong		100,771	4,083	24.68
3	Li County	理县	Lǐ Xiàn	བཀྲ་ཤིས་གླིང་།	bkra shis gling	pauɕuq	46,556	4,318	10.78
4	Mao County	茂县	Mào Xiàn	མའོ་ཝུན།	ma'o wun	ʂqini	104,829	4,075	25.72
5	Songpan County	松潘县	Sōngpān Xiàn	ཟུང་ཆུ་རྫོང་།	zung chu rdzong		72,309	8,486	8.52
6	Jiuzhaigou County	九寨沟县	Jiǔzhàigōu Xiàn	གཟི་རྩ་སྡེ་དགུ་རྫོང་།	gzi rtsa sde dgu rdzong		81,394	5,286	15.39
7	Jinchuan County	金川县	Jīnchuān Xiàn	ཆུ་ཆེན་རྫོང་།	chu chen rdzong		65,976	5,524	11.94
8	Xiaojin County	小金县	Xiǎojīn Xiàn	བཙན་ལྷ་རྫོང་།	btsan lha rdzong		77,731	5,571	13.95
9	Heishui County	黑水县	Hēishuǐ Xiàn	ཁྲོ་ཆུ་རྫོང་།	khro chu rdzong	khǝtʂǝp	60,704	4,154	14.61
10	Zamtang County (Rangtang County)	壤塘县	Rǎngtáng Xiàn	འཛམ་ཐང་རྫོང་།	'dzam thang rdzong		39,173	6,836	5.73
11	Ngawa County (Aba County)	阿坝县	Ābà Xiàn	རྔ་བ་རྫོང་།	rnga ba rdzong	Ggabba	72,391	10,435	6.93
12	Zoigê County (Ruo'ergai County)	若尔盖县	Ruò'ěrgài Xiàn	མཛོད་དགེ་རྫོང་།	mdzod dge rdzong		74,619	10,437	7.14
13	Hongyuan County	红原县	Hóngyuán Xiàn	རྐ་ཁོག་རྫོང་། / ཁྱུང་མཆུ་རྫོང་།	rka khog rdzong / khyung mchu rdzong		43,818	8,398	5.21

Though situated within Wenchuan County, Wolong National Nature Reserve and Wolong Special Administrative Region are administered separately by the Forestry Department of Sichuan.

Transportation

Taxi fare for Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport in Ngawa prefecture

The prefecture is served by Hongyuan Airport in the west and Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport in the east. Private taxis can be hired from these airports. Jiuzhaigou Train Station is under construction 55 km (34 mi) north-west of Jiuzhaigou County's town. The railway is to run between Chengdu and Lanzhou.

Tourism

Songpan Bridge

Kirti Gompa

Aerial panorama of Waqie Talin 瓦切塔林 in Hongyuan county.

Aerial perspective of the Songpan Ancient City walls and fort. October 2023.

Tourism produced 71.0% of the GDP of the prefecture in 2006.^[9] There are many places of interest in the prefecture, including

• Wolong National Nature Reserve in Wenchuan County, a well-known giant panda reserve where the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda was established in 1980
• Kirti Gompa, a 15th-century Tibetan Buddhism monastery
• Nangzhik Gompa monastery, founded in the 12th century
• Huanglong Scenic and Historic Interest Area in Songpan County
• Jiuzhaigou, Jiuzhaigou County, a nature reserve known for its many multi-level waterfalls and colorful lakes, declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1992
• Mount Siguniang (Chinese: 四姑娘山 Tibetan: སྐུ་བླ, Wylie: sku bla "Sku Mountain"; formerly Chinese: 四姑山, a transcription), the highest point of the Qionglai Mountains, on the border between Xiaojin County (Chinese: 小金县; Tibetan: Tibetan: བཙན་ལྷ) and Wenchuan County.