China faces a severe situation in flood control and drought relief
this summer, warned Zhang Zhitong, deputy chief of the Office of
the State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters.
Zhang made the remarks at a press conference Friday morning held by
the State Council Information Office. He pointed out although
northern areas have seen increased rainfall to varying degrees, the
general situation including less water in rivers, inadequate water
conservation of irrigation projects and continuous drop of
underground water level has not fundamentally changed.
Zhang Zhitong gave a brief on current flooding and droughts. At
present, China has entered into its flood season gradually from the
south to the north. The water level in the major rivers and lakes
is stable while local floods have occurred in some parts of China
and severe droughts took place in northeast China.
Since the beginning of this year, precipitation in most parts of
north China and parts of northwest China have been more than the
yearly average. Precipitation in most parts of the northeast and
parts of coastal provinces have been less than the yearly average.
In the rest of the country, precipitation is close to the yearly
average. Affected by intense rainfall, a big flood within the
returned period of once every 10 years occurred in the Xiangjiang
River in Hunan Province in mid-May. Floods exceeding warning levels
occurred one after another in the Ganjiang River in Jiangxi,
Minjiang River in Fujian, Beijiang River and Hanjiang River in
Guangdong and Yili River in Xinjiang. Severe torrential floods
occurred in some regions. By June 10, 976,000 hectares of crops
were affected by floods. Some 16.93 million people were affected
where 186 people died. Compared with flood disasters in history,
all figures are lower than those in the same period in the
past.
In
addition, in mid-March, 17 million hectares of crops were affected,
which is close to the average figure in the same period in history.
Since the end of March, droughts in most places have improved.
Currently, 10 million hectares of crops have been affected, over 8
million urban and rural people and 3.8 million large livestock have
suffered from temporary drinking water difficulty. The main
affected areas are mainly in northeast China.
According to the forecast of meteorologist departments, two rain
zones will appear in the north and south from June to August this
summer. Precipitation in the north will be more than the average of
the previous four years. Based on historical flood statistics, the
probability of large floods in major rivers such as the Yellow
River, Haihe River and Huaihe River this year will increase. Since
China has a large territory, even if no basin-wide large floods
occur, regional torrential floods and typhoons are unavoidable.
Now the south has just entered into its crucial flood season and
the "plum rain period" has not started yet. The crucial flood
season in most parts of the north is from July to August. With the
arrival of the crucial flood season, there will be frequent rain
and a tropical cyclone, which may result in severe flood disasters
in some areas at any time.
(China.org.cn June 13, 2003)