Shanghai is situated at 31'14' north latitude and 121'29' east longitude. Bordering on Jiangsu and Zhejiang Provinces on the west,
Shanghai is washed by the East China Sea on the east and Hangzhou Bay on the south. North of the city, the Yangtze River pours into the East China Sea. It also assumes the central location
along China's coastal line. Thanks to its advantageous geographic location, Shanghai has today become an excellent sea and river port, boasting easy accesses to a vast hinterland.
With a pleasant northern subtropical maritime monsoon climate, Shanghai enjoys four distinct seasons, generous sunshine and abundant rainfall every year. Its spring and autumn are relatively short comparing with the summer and winter. In 2000, the average annual temperature was 17.6 degrees Celsius. The city had a frost-free period of 300 days a year, and received an average annual rainfall of 1,302 millimeters. However, nearly 50% of the precipitation came during the May-September flood season, which is divided into three rainy periods, namely, the Spring Rains, the Plum Rains and the Autumn Rains.