Urbanization Development Levels And Regional Difference Of Urbanizationin Shanxi Province

Urbanization is the effective driving force for the development of industrialization and modernization.It is also the necessary means to solve the problem of "agriculture,rural areas and farmers". It helps to reduce the regional difference and to promote the regional coordinated development.It is an inevitable choice to expand the domestic demand and to promote the all-round social progress. However,according to the current development situation of Shanxi Province,there exists a large gap of urbanization among Shanxi and other advanced provinces.Comprehensive develpopment level of urbanization is obvious different among different regions.Both scales and structures in small towns and cities,medium-sized and large cities are unreasonable.The development levels in different regions are uneven.And all those reasons led to low level of comprehensive development of urbanization in Shanxi Province.Therefore it is very important to use scientific analysis methods for scientific evaluation on the comprehensive development level of urbanization,to fully Shanxi Province in order to evaluate their comprehensivedevelopment levels of urbanization. Firstly, the basic concepts andthe related theoretical basis of urbanization were simply described.Secondly, the current situation and the existing problems ofurbanization were analyed. Thirdly, comprehensive evaluationsystem of urbanization was constructed based on the presentsituation of urbanization in Shanxi Province. The weights of thefactors and indexes of urbanization were determined by usingentropy method in order to achieve the scores of comprehensivedevelopment level in each prefecture-level cities. Fourthly, thecomprehensive development level and development level of eachelement of urbanization were analyzed based on the software Exceland ArcGIS, meanwhile, the regional differences of urbanizationfrom2008to2012were studied in order to explore the evolutionprocess of urbanization during the five years in Shanxi Province.Furthermore, the causes of the regional difference of urbanizationin Shanxi Province were analyzed. Finally, according to the currentsituation of urbanization and the reason for regional difference, thecountermeasures for regional harmonious development were putforward in Shanxi Province.The research results showed that:1) there existed an obviousregional difference in Shanxi Province. Among different influencefactors of urbanization, the economic difference was the mostdistinctive;2) from the angle of space, the development levels ofurbanization in southeastern and northern Shanxi Province wererelatively high, while in central and southwestern Shanxi Provincewere relatively low;3) from the angel of time, the development level of urbanization among different regions was narrowing withinsignificant level during2008-2012in Shanxi Province. Based onabove analysis, four countermeasures were put forward:1) theurban system in Shanxi Province needed to be perfected. The urbanagglomerations needed to be improved. And small towns and citieswith prominent advantages needed to be impoved;2) in order tonarrow down the regional difference of urbanization, the strengthsof government should increase over the underdevelopment areas;3)the industrial structure should be upgraded so as to promote thecoordinated development of industrialization and urbanization;4)the construction of infrastructures should be strengthened. Theregional ecological environment should be improved. At last, thelevel of urbanization in Shanxi Province would increase.