The results of an ongoing island census will be released this year, and nameless islands will be named, an oceanic official said.

Started early last year, the census is aimed at clarifying the total number, area and resources data of the country's islands, said Liu Cigui, head of the State Oceanic Administration.

"China has a large number of islands, most of which are uninhabited, and some have vanished due to human damage and natural erosion," said Liu on the sidelines of the annual session of the National People's Congress, the top legislator.

They were cases that people dug in islands to get soil or linked two islands together by filling in between. The islands are not what they were, Liu said.

On March 1, 2010, China put into effect the "Law on Island Protection", which is conducive to better island protection and the management of uninhabited islands, Liu said.

China had conducted an island census in the 1980s, which showed that the country had more than 6,500 uninhabited islands, accounting for 93.8 percent of the total.

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