ORGANIZATIONS and individuals who want to lease one of the three uninhabited Shenzhen islands would have to pay at least 9 million yuan (US$137,000), according to national regulations, the Shenzhen Economic Daily reported.
The highest cost was 240,000 yuan per hectare a year and intending lessees would have to pay the 50-year lease in one payment.
For example, the lease for the smallest island, Zhouzi, was about 9 million yuan because islands in Shenzhen were normally leased at the highest rate, said Yang Kun, deputy director of the ocean management department of the city s ocean administration.
Despite the large sum of money required to lease an island, the cost of exploitation was also high. Nearly all uninhabited islands in Shenzhen have no water, power or transport, Yang said.
The first problem was transport and a port would be needed if houses or facilities were to be built, an unidentified expert in island construction told yesterday s Southern Metropolis Daily. It cost a lot more to build a house on an island than on the mainland and more money would be needed to build roads and power stations.
A Shenzhen man called Wang Shuchun leased Sanmen Island in Huizhou for 50 years in 1997. The monthly expenses are more than 300,000 yuan, the expert said.
Besides money, typhoons were another big problem for island construction. All buildings could be destroyed if there was a strong typhoon, the expert said.
Yang suggested those who were interested should have a look at islands off Zhuhai and Huizhou.
There were 39 uninhabited islands in Shenzhen, including 23 in Daya Bay, five in Dapeng Bay and 11 in the Western sea area. Nine of these islands do not even have names yet, Yang said.
Uninhabited islands means there is no hukou registered. But there are people working on some of these islands, he said.
Shenzhen Guangqian Power Plant was on Dachan Island, one of the three islands available for development. (Wang Yuanyuan)
