Nantong, city in China, in eastern Jiangsu province. Nantong is located on the north shore of the Yangtze River, near the river's mouth on the Yellow Sea. Canals connect Nantong with the Grand Canal at Yangzhou, and it can be reached by boat from Shanghai. The region around Nantong produces cotton, salt, and rice. Textile production is Nantong's most important economic activity; the city also has port facilities and high-technology and export-oriented industries. Nantong University is located here.
As late as the period of the Tang (T'ang) dynasty (618-907), the seacoast in this part of Jiangsu was much farther west, and the area of Nantong was an outlying county called Hailing. It grew as a center for commerce and communications. It was named Nantong in 1724. In 1895 a native of Nantong, named Zhang Jian, founded China's first modern cotton textile factory, the Dasheng Cotton Textile Mill. In 1984 the city became one of the first 14 coastal cities the China opened to foreign investment. Population (1991) 323,941.
