The land coverage of the Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) was extended to 27.3 square kilometers due to land reclamation in 2003, according to figures released by the Macao Statistics and Census Bureau Monday.  

Statistics from the bureau suggested that Macao's land coverage, which includes the Macao Peninsula, the Taipa and Coloane islands, increased by 5.8 percent from 25.8 square kilometers in 2002. While back to 1991, Macao's total area was 18 square kilometers.

The gradual expansion in land coverage was a result of land reclamation for several large infrastructure construction projects including the building of a cross-border industrial park with neighboring Zhuhai City in south China's Guangdong Province and an entertainment wharf built on the southern seashore of the Macao Peninsula, which is expected to be a new tourist attraction when completed in 2005.

Evolved from a small fishing village, Macao has 400 years of history, which was the landing place marking westerners' arrivals in the Oriental Continent. Protected by China's "one country, two systems" principle, Macao has sustained its 40-year-odd gaming industry after it returned to the motherland in 1999 from the former Portuguese ruling.

The opening-up of the gaming market in 2002 and the start of regional economic cooperation with members in the Pan-Pearl River Delta region in 2004 have boosted the local real estate confidence and incentives for land reclamation.

(Xinhua News Agency July 13, 2004)