Since 1949,

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

has carried out extensive

land reclamation Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamati ...

projects. It is among the countries which have built the most artificial land; from 1949 to 1990s, the total area of land reclaimed from the sea of China was about 13,000 km².

Mainland China

Donghai Island - P1580308 - Dongcan Village - dike

Bingzhou Peninsula area - land reclamation - DSCF9205

A grand total of 150 km² was planned to be reclaimed from the sea in 2009.

Guangdong

From June 2004 to the present, land reclamation is going on at

Shantou Shantou, alternately romanized as Swatow and sometimes known as Santow, is a prefecture-level city on the eastern coast of Guangdong, China, with a total population of 5,502,031 as of the 2020 census (5,391,028 in 2010) and an administrative ...

. Project surface to reclaim is 146 km².

Jiangsu

Between 2009 and 2020, Jiangsu will reclaim 21 parcels of tidal areas along the southern Yellow Sea, yielding a total of 1,817 square km of new land.

Liaoning

Starting in March 2005, the Caofeidian Land Reclamation Project (曹妃甸围海造地工程) reclaimed a total of 310 km² next to the island of

Tangshan Tangshan () is a coastal, industrial prefecture-level city in the northeast of Hebei province. It is located in the eastern part of Hebei Province and the northeastern part of the North China Plain. It is located in the central area of the Boha ...

. The first stage of 12 km² was finished on 28 March 2006. The plan is to make space for the new industrial base of

Shougang Shougang Group Co., Ltd., formerly Shougang Corporation is a Chinese state-owned steel company. Based in Beijing, its the Shijingshan district operations were moved out of the city prior to the Olympics due to concerns over pollution. Its subs ...

Shanghai

Between 2003 and 2006, the Shanghai government spent 40 billion yuan on the

Nanhui New City Nanhui New City () is a planned city located in the Pudong New Area of Shanghai, China. It was formerly called Lingang New City (临港新城) until it was renamed in April 2012. Construction began in 2003 and is scheduled to be completed in 20 ...

, formerly called Lingang New City Project (临港新城计划) of

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...

, to reclaim 133.3 km² of artificial land from the sea.

Zhejiang

Starting in 1975, the largest single land reclamation project in Zhejiang Province has been the Xuanmen Land Reclamation Project (漩门围垦工程) in Yuhuan County. It has three phases, of which phase II covered 53.3 km² (February 1999 - April 2001), and phase III 45.3 km² (March 2006 - 2010). * Total land reclamation in the area of

Taizhou City Taizhou (Taichow) may refer to either of two cities in eastern China: * Taizhou, Jiangsu (), located on the Yangtze River, northwest of Shanghai * Taizhou, Zhejiang (), located along the East China Sea, south of Shanghai See also * Táozhōu, ...

between 2004 and 2010, including the project mentioned above, will be 266.7 km².

Special Administrative Regions

Hong Kong

The government of Hong Kong started reclaiming land from the surrounding sea as early as the 1840s. Formal reclamation starts at 1860s and its land reclamation is still proceeding. A notable achievement is

Hong Kong International Airport Hong Kong International Airport is Hong Kong's main airport, built on reclaimed land on the island of Chek Lap Kok, Hong Kong. The airport is also referred to as Chek Lap Kok International Airport or ''Chek Lap Kok Airport'', to distinguish ...

, built in the 1990s on reclaimed land, absorbing the former islands

Chek Lap Kok Chek Lap Kok is an island in the western waters of Hong Kong's New Territories. Unlike the smaller Lam Chau, it was only partially leveled when it was assimilated via land reclamation into the island for the current Hong Kong International ...

and

Lam Chau Lam Chau () was a little island in Hong Kong. It was one of the two original islands that made up the site of the current Hong Kong International Airport. The small island lay to the west of Chek Lap Kok and north of Lantau Island. It had an ar ...

Macau

The original size of

Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a pop ...

was expanded by 170% (17 km² of artificial land). Currently the land reclamation of Macau is still ongoing.

South China Sea

In the 21st century, the

PRC China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...

has upheld the 1947 claims of the

Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast ...

(modified by

Zhou Enlai Zhou Enlai (; 5 March 1898 – 8 January 1976) was a Chinese statesman and military officer who served as the first Premier of the People's Republic of China, premier of the People's Republic of China from 1 October 1949 until his death on 8 J ...

into a Nine-Dash Line) over most of the

South China Sea The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by the shores of South China (hence the name), in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan and northwestern Phil ...

through a series of

disputed Controversy is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of conflicting opinion or point of view. The word was coined from the Latin ''controversia'', as a composite of ''controversus'' – "turned in an opposite d ...

mid-ocean land reclamation projects in the

Spratly Islands The Spratly Islands ( fil, Kapuluan ng Kalayaan; zh, c=南沙群島/南沙群岛, s=, t=, p=Nánshā Qúndǎo; Malay, id, Kepulauan Spratly; vi, Quần đảo Trường Sa) are a disputed archipelago in the South China Sea. Composed o ...

known as the "

Great Wall of Sand "Great Wall of Sand" is a name first used in March 2015 by US Admiral Harry Harris, who was commander of the Pacific Fleet, to describe a series of uniquely large-scale land reclamation projects by the People's Republic of China (PRC) in th ...

". The islands being expanded or created by the project are notionally administered as parts of

Sansha Sansha City () is a prefecture-level city under the Hainan province of the People's Republic of China (PRC), and is the southernmost and least populated prefecture in China, with the smallest land area but the largest maritime territory. The ci ...

Hainan Province Hainan (, ; ) is the smallest and southernmost province of the People's Republic of China (PRC), consisting of various islands in the South China Sea. , the largest and most populous island in China,The island of Taiwan, which is slightly l ...

. As of December 2016, the projects in the Spratlies covered of land protected by "'significant' weapons systems, including

anti-aircraft Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...

and

anti-missile system Missile defense is a system, weapon, or technology involved in the detection, tracking, interception, and also the destruction of attacking missiles. Conceived as a defense against nuclear weapon, nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic mis ...

s".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Land Reclamation, China Coastal construction History of the People's Republic of China Land reclamation