BEIJING: The Ministry of Water Resources has promised to keep releasing water from the main reservoirs along the Yangtze River to help relieve the severe drought affecting Asia’s longest watercourse, as the lingering heat wave and low levels of precipitation have disrupted water supplies and irrigation across the region.
So far this month, the ministry has discharged 5.3 billion cubic meters of water from reservoirs into the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze, Vice-Minister of Water Resources Liu Weiping told a news conference on Wednesday. The amount of water is enough to meet the annual water demands of Beijing, a city of almost 22 million residents. On average, about 4 billion cubic meters of water is consumed in the capital every year.
Given that it is a critical period for the growth of rice and other crops in the basin, the ministry began the new plan to discharge water on Tuesday, and is expected to add a further 1.5 billion cubic meters of water to the lower reaches of the river, Liu said.
Despite the severe drought, the minister stressed that there has been no major change to the amount of water stored in the basin’s main reservoirs. Though still experiencing its annual rainy season, precipitation in the region has declined from average levels for the period by 45 percent since July, he said, adding that water in the main body of the Yangtze and in two major lakes in its basin, Dongting and Poyang, has fallen to its lowest recorded level.
Aside from disrupting supplies to over 830,000 people and 160,000 livestock, the drought has affected the irrigation of over 820,000 hectares in eight provincial regions, including Hubei and Anhui provinces and Chongqing municipality, the vice-minister continued, but emphasized that the water supply to large and medium-sized irrigation zones and urban areas can currently be guaranteed. –Agencies
