Chongqing (Chinese: 重庆), formerly transliterated as Chungking[a], is a major city in southwest China. Administratively, it is one of China's four direct-controlled municipalities (the other three are Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin), and the only such municipality in China located far away from the coast.[7]The municipality was created on 14 March 1997 to help the Three Gorges Dam migration, succeeding the sub-provincial city administration that was part of Sichuan Province.[8] Chongqing's population as of 2015 is just over 30 million with an urban population of 18.38 million. Of these, approximately 8.5 million people live in Chongqing city proper; Fuling District, Wanzhou District and Qianjiang District are in fact cities in their own right, and along with the city proper constitute a metropolitan area.[9] According to the 2010 census, Chongqing is the most populous Chinese municipality,[10] and also the largest and poorest direct-controlled municipality in China, and comprises 26 districts, 8 counties, and 4 autonomous counties.The official abbreviation of the city, Yu (渝), was approved by the State Council on 18 April 1997.[11] This abbreviation is derived from the old name of a part of the Jialing River that runs through Chongqing and feeds into the Yangtze River. Chongqing was also a Sichuan province municipality during the Republic of China (ROC) administration, serving as its wartime capital during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945).Chongqing has a significant history and culture and serves as the economic centre of the upstream Yangtze basin. It is a major manufacturing centre and transportation hub; a July 2012 report by the Economist Intelligence Unit described it as one of China's "30 emerging megacities".