Over 15 km 2 of land has been reclaimed around the Shekou peninsula, Shenzhen, China. Itu Aba. In response to U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter’s charge that China has “intensified the […] You’ll notice that the images have some striking differences, especially in the highlighted areas which show massive land reclamation (the creation of new land where there was once water) and the addition of a bridge linking Shenzhen Bay to Hong Kong.Clearly the higher magnification imagery is newer but what’s more interesting is the massive rate at which the land mass is being expanded. The reclamation of land from the ocean has long been used in mountainous Hong Kong to expand the limited supply of usable land with a total of around 60 square kilometres of land created by 1996. China is building up artificial islands in the disputed South China Sea—even building basketball and tennis courts on the reclaimed land A map of China’s shifting definition of the so-called Nine-Dash Line. The photographs show the expansion of the land area and the addition of buildings at Vietnamese-controlled Sand Cay and West London Reef in … As observed on the physical map of Maco, the region comprises of a peninsula attached to mainland Asia and the islands of Coloane and Taipa in the South China Sea. "China has expanded the acreage on the outposts it occupies by some four hundred times," said a US defense official. Land reclamation for development activities (infrastructure, industrial, recreation, and tourism) often results an adverse impact on mudflats, mangroves, and fish stocks in WCPM. China's land reclamation in disputed waters stokes fears of military ambitions. This article is more than 5 years old. One critical question will be whether it claims an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) for each of the features being developed. Land reclamation refers to the process of creating or restoring new land from waterlogged areas, lakebeds or oceans. US officials say China has reclaimed 810 hectares (2,000 acres) since the beginning of 2014. As China continues its reclamation activities in the South China Sea, there is speculation that it will use the new land masses to justify its international legal claims. The United States did not endorse land reclamation by any of the countries with territorial claims in the South China Sea, but "the pace and scale of China`s land reclamation in recent years dwarfs that of any other claimant," the official said. On June 16, 2015, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang announced that “as planned, the land reclamation project of China’s construction on some stationed islands and reefs of the Nansha (Spratly) Islands will be completed in the upcoming days.” He went on to note that after land reclamation on existing features was complete, China would continue to […] While many have criticisms and concerns, China feels this reclamation is necessary in order to keep up with others in […] The scope of reclamation in China has closely followed its coastal economic development. Soil salinization and underground structure erosion usually occur in land reclamation regions, especially under semi‐humid climate that annual evaporation is larger than annual rainfall in Northern China. It is straining geopolitical tensions that were already taut. Coastal land reclamation has reduced the land area covered by wetlands; since 1949, the loss of coastal wetlands in China is estimated to have been of the order of 22,000 km 2 (Tian et al., 2016, Wang et al., 2014). The new land, also known as landfills, makes the land more useful for activities such as farming, forestry, port expansion, beach replenishment or construction of commercial complexes. Land reclamation in Hong Kong: Grey (built), Red (proposed or under development). 1. The land is already providing China, “the factory of the world,” with much of its raw materials, especially oil, gas and timber. Newly released images show Vietnam has carried out significant land reclamation at two sites in the disputed South China Sea, though the scale and pace is dwarfed by China’s own land reclamation projects, a U.S. research institute said Friday. Note that most of the urban area (shown in pink in the map below) of Hong Kong is on the reclaimed land. The peninsula reclamation project is equally as dramatic... you can see how Avenida Do Amizade ran right along the South China Sea, with Hotel Lisboa, Presidente, and the rest of the peninsula xs had waterfront views before Wynn Macau, Starworld, MGM Macau and the throngs of high rise apartment and office buildings were built on the new land reclaims. The Communist government has made this an important national objective since the party came to power in the late 1940s. Growing international criticism of China’s land reclamation in the South China Sea and the publication of detailed images of China’s dredging and construction activities prompted the Chinese government to explain in greater detail than ever before the purpose of these activities. The US says that China has expanded its programme of land reclamation in the South China Sea. Since 2014, China has attracted tremendous regional and international attention through its land reclamation activities in some features of the Spratlys which it controls, namely Gaven Reef, Cuarteron Reef, Johnson South Reef and Fiery Cross. China's speedy 'land reclamation' project in the South China Sea is stirring concerns among its neighbors. The largest land feature in the Spratly Islands, the only Spratly Island with fresh ground water, and the only island that Taiwan occupies in the South China Sea; 1.3 kilometers in length and less than half a square kilometer in total area; Held by Taiwan since 1946, when Japan left the island at the end of the Second World War Based on investigations into the status and trends of land reclamation soil along the Bohai Rim, China, this chapter summarizes the evolution of groundwater system and soil environment … The Chinese government is threatening the marine biodiversity in the South China Sea through land reclamation.Beijing already added more the 1,200 hectares to the islands in the region since December 2013, according to the article written by James Borton and Nguyen Chu Hoi.. China is the country that leads the world in land reclamation spaces, with around 4,600 square miles of such spaces added to date. China says its land reclamation work in the South China Sea is "totally justifiable" as it has "sovereignty" over the area. ... 2015 statement from the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs on China’s land reclamation efforts in the South China Sea. China has already undertaken reclamation work on six other reefs it occupies in the Spratlys, expanding land mass five-fold, aerial surveillance photos show. A new Pentagon report says China has reclaimed more than 3,200 acres of land in the south-eastern South China Sea.But the country’s focus … Real-time & Street-level Air Quality Information in Golmud Land Reclamation Co. Ltd., China Used By 85 Million People Worldwide Protestors display placards during a rally outside the Chinese Consulate in Makati, the Philippines, to protest China's reclamation activities in the South China Sea on February 10, 2018. In more recent times, land reclamation has converted it into a peninsula. ... facts on the ground can become lines on the map. For the first time, China's Foreign Ministry went into detail on the purpose of land reclamation in the South China Sea. Land has been reclaimed along the coastal areas in many parts of the world to meet the growing demand for houses and other land use. [1] Since China’s land reclamation efforts began in December 2013, it had reclaimed more than 2,900 acres (1,170 hectares) of land as of June 2015, … Reclamation efforts may be concerned with the improvement of rainfall-deficient areas by irrigation, the removal of detrimental constituents from salty or alkali lands, the diking and draining of tidal marshes, the smoothing and revegetation of strip-mine spoil areas, and similar activities. Macao was formerly an island itself but was gradually connected to mainland by a growing sandbar. China has been feverishly piling sand onto reefs in the South China Sea for the past year, creating seven new islets in the region. Land reclamation, the process of improving lands to make them suitable for a more intensive use. New Pentagon report warns that while intent for South China … Land reclamation off Prai in Penang and Kuala Juru for industrial purposes has threatened cockle farming because of high levels of heavy metals and sedimentation. Since 1949, land reclamation has been continuous across all coastal provinces and metropolises in China ().Based on both historical statistics and satellite images, it is estimated that a total area of 13 380 km 2 has been reclaimed between 1950 and 2008 (Fu et al., 2010). Overlaying the ecotope map with recent and proposed land reclamation schemes revealed a loss of ecotopes, composed of the high-range (42%), mid-range (48%), and low-range (38%) littoral habitats, corresponding to a 44%–45% loss of the most important ecotopes for bar-tailed godwit and great knot (mid-range and low-range littoral zones). Drawing a roadmap to combat the spread of deserts worldwide. 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