New price records have emerged from land deals in cities from Wuhan to Guangzhou despite Beijing’s pledges to tame land inflation, reflecting the weakness of a centralized campaign to cool the housing market, according to the South China Morning Post. The mainland’s land market, dominated by municipal governments, plays a central role in the country’s urbanisation. Local governments rely on land sales for revenues, developers are eager to launch projects in big cities, and both the banking system and its shadow counterpart offer credit to grease the deals. On Tuesday, Longfor Properties and Beijing Capital Development won a land parcel in Guangzhou’s Baiyun New Town in a joint bid of about $463 million, paying about $6,800 per square meter for the site.