The average price of a square meter of urban land in China grew 6 percent to 1,198 yuan (US$144) last year, the Ministry of Land and Resources said on Saturday.
The ministry, in a report on price changes in 51 medium and large Chinese cities, said that land prices in southeast China were the highest at 1,621 yuan per square meter, while prices in northwest China were the lowest at 777 yuan.
Meanwhile, land prices in China's central, southwest and northeast regions registered higher growth rates than the national average. The central area, registered 9.24 percent growth, the southwest 10.56 percent and the northeast 7.25 percent.
Land prices in the Yangtze River Delta region rose 6.9 percent, with the price for residential land jumping 12.16 percent to 1,540 yuan per square meter.
In Beijing and the northern port city of Tianjin, land prices grew 5.76 percent to 2,009 yuan per square meter. Looking at the separate sectors, commercial land were sold for 3,875 yuan per square meter on average, residential land 1,746 yuan and industrial land 520 yuan.
The report attributed land price growth mainly to strong demand and the tightening of the country's land policy. It went on to predict that land prices would continue to grow steadily in 2005.
In 2004, China's housing prices grew 11.7 percent from a year earlier. In Shanghai, housing prices increased 14.6 percent last year, compared with the figure for 2003.