China Builds New Housing on Key South China Sea Island to Support Growing Population

China is set to construct new housing to accommodate nearly 400 people on Woody Island, a sign of its effort to support a growing population on this key outpost in the disputed South China Sea, Chinese government documents and satellite imagery show. Bidding documents acquired by Radio Free Asia show that local officials started planning the public housing facility in mid-2020. It is the fifth such facility to be built on Woody since 2012, when China established Sansha City on the island to administer the Paracels, Spratlys, and other contested areas.

According to the records, Hainan Fangcheng Construction and Engineering Group Company Limited, a private enterprise, won the construction contract earlier this month. One of these documents reveals the planned location for the new building along Beijing Erheng Road, about 200 meters away from the city government headquarters in Sansha City.

Satellite imagery reviewed by RFA shows that an area on Beijing Erheng Road corresponding to the location described in the document was cleared in August 2020. The cleared area is between another public housing building and the city’s public security bureau, both of which are named in the bidding document.

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