Gansu

western limit of the Great Wall of China

Gansu, Wade-Giles romanization Kan-su, conventional Kansu, sheng (province), north-central and northwestern China. It is bordered by Mongolia to the north, the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region to the northeast, the Hui Autonomous Region of Ningxia and the province of Shaanxi to the east, the provinces of Sichuan and Qinghai to the south and southwest, and the Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang to the west. A vital strategic pivot linking the centre of the country with the vast territory in the extreme west, the narrow corridor of Gansu has served for several centuries as a passageway between the upper Huang He (Yellow River) area and Chinese Turkistan. The capital is Lanzhou in central Gansu, on the south bank of the Huang He. Area 141,500 square miles (366,500 square km). Pop. (2020) 25,019,831.