More than 760 residents of Junxian County in the Danjiangkou Reservoir area on Tuesday began new lives 300 km away with uncertainty and hope.

They have been moved to new homes in central China's Hubei Province to make way for the giant south-to-north water diversion project.

They were among 330,000 migrants expected to be relocated by 2014 for the multi-million-dollar project, which is designed to channel water from southern regions, mainly the Yangtze, China's longest river, to the arid north, including Beijing.

LIFE SUSPENDED

Sitting on the border of Hubei and Henan provinces, the Danjiangkou reservoir is the water source for the central route of the project.

Since the 1990s, farmers in the reservoir area have been expecting to move imminently for the project, which will raise the dam level from its previous 157 meters above sea level to 176 meters, to store water for Henan and Hebei provinces as well as Beijing and Tianjin cities. Construction of new houses, roads and power grids have been suspended since then.

For almost 20 years, their lives have been on hold as the scheduled completion of the project moved from 2008 to 2010 and now 2014.

"My kitchen collapsed six years ago," said Li Yuanchun, 51, from the Wugumiao Village, Danjiangkou City. "But I never built a new one as the government would not compensate me for new buildings."

For Chen Yuming, another villager, life has been waiting to move. He earned 40,000 to 50,000 yuan a year tending more than a hectare of orange trees, but the walls and roofs of his mud-brick home were cracked.

Li and Chen, as well 28 other households in the village, were scheduled to move to Shayang County, about 300 km away, next year.

Young men found marriage nigh on impossible as women in other townships were reluctant to accept the village's poor homes and uncertain future.

All these problems stemmed from China's water shortage: water resources per capita are just a quarter of the world average. The northern region is only one fifth of the national level.

In 2002, construction began on the long-planned water transfer project, which was expected to benefit about 300 million people in north China.

The diversion will cut hydropower generation in Danjiangkou City. Many firms from coastal areas cancelled investment plans because of a lack of cheap electricity, says Tian Liqi, deputy director of the city environment bureau.

As a state-level poor city, Danjiangkou has rejected lots of projects with environmental risks, he said. "We want to develop our economy and create jobs for our people, but the priority is to protect the water quality in the reservoir."

With few factories to work in, residents plant orange trees to earn a living, and more importantly, to protect the eco-system in the reservoir area. The trees increase forest coverage and prevent water and soil loss.

However, growers often suffer falling sales or price dives in the unstable market.

Farmers say a kilogram of oranges sells for just 40 to 60 fen in the good times.

Last year, an orange worm infestation broke out in southwest China's Sichuan Province, affecting sales across the country. Tons of oranges remain unsold, and growers in Danjiangkou went bankrupt.