BEIJING, April 6 (Reuters) - China will limit the building of man-made islands to help protect the marine environment and will ensure that any islands built are not too close together and do not affect shipping, a state newspaper said on Friday.

Noting that artificial islands can help solve tight land supply problems in the country's booming and heavily populated coastal regions, the official People's Daily said it also was important to control their development.

"Building too many artificial islands, too concentrated together within a specific area of ocean can have disastrous consequences on the marine environment," it said, citing new guidelines from the State Oceanic Administration.

The guidelines also take aim at reclamation projects where islands are linked to the shore by filling in the water between them, a method often used in China.

"The building of man-made islands, especially the linking of islands to the land, can alter sea currents and thus change (the life) of marine animals, water flows and the lay of the ocean floor," it added.

The report did not mention specific projects or areas where land reclamation or the building of artificial islands is happening.

China, where more than 300 million people live within 100 km (62 miles) of a coast, reclaimed 300 square kilometres of land every year between 2001 and 2006, state media said earlier this year.

That is damaging an ecosystem already suffering from over-fishing and the indiscriminate dumping of sewage and other waste at sea, conservations experts say.

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