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China borders on 4 sea areas, namely Bohai area, Yellow sea area, East China sea area and South sea area together with Pacific sea area to the east of Taiwan. All the China sea areas are rich in resources, vast in territory, proper in geographical location and appropriate in climate. And also they have rich resources of ocean fishery, inter-tidal beach, undersea mineral, coastal salt and ocean powers. The natural size of china seas is up to 4.727 million square kilometers, about half of the size of the land space of China. China coastline is about 18 thousand kilometers long, along which are more than 6,500 islands, 160 gulfs and bays, over 700 harbors and ports (including over 300 deepwater ports). The inter-tidal beach occupies a space of 20 thousand square kilometers, which has great potentials for development. With the fine conditions for development, which are provided by the sea, the coastal regions goes rapidly in the social and economic development and they have become a populated area with active economies centering there. In the year of 1997, to total value of sea industry was about RMB 310.4 billion Yuan, among which the aquatic products accounts for 156.9 billion Yuan, crude oil and natural gas 24.8 billion Yuan, coastal sand mineral 88 million Yuan, sea salt industry 79.3 billion Yuan, ship-building 22.8 billion Yuan, sea transportation 52.2 billion Yuan and international tours and travels along the sea 45.8 billion Yuan. The Chinese coastal continental slope stretch into the sea widely with nearly 10 thousand oceanic living species and the costal inter-tidal beach is the best area for developing marine farming. According to the estimation by relevant departments, the effective exploration size of the Chinese coastal continental slope together with the southern part of the South Sea is 1 million square kilometers, the total volume of crude oil reserve is about 15-40 billion tons, natural gas reserve is about 100 thousand cubic meters, sea energy reserve is about 431 million KW and the theoretical reserve of the sea energy is about 630 million KW. |