- BEIJING (Reuters) - The largest
natural lake in northern China appears doomed to dry out early next year,
parched by lack of rainfall and reckless use of water by factories and
farmers, a water resources official said on Wednesday.
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- The threat to the Baiyangdian Lake in Hebei province
has highlighted a water crisis in China so severe it threatens the country's
economic development and social stability.
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- It will not be the first time the lake has been completely
drained, although this time officials warn it can be rescued only by a
massive water diversion program now on the drawing board.
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- Hundreds of thousands of people have grown dependent
on its water for drinking, fishing and agriculture.
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- ``It will dry up again next spring if there is insufficient
rainfall from now,'' the official with the Water Resources Bureau in the
provincial city of Baoding said.
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- ``It will directly affect the lives of people living
in surrounding villages,'' he said. ``Their daily incomes are mainly from
fishing and reed products. Grain production in the lower portion of Baiyangdian
will also be greatly reduced.''
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- The official declined to give his name.
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- ``Bright Pearl'' Plundered
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- Nicknamed the ``bright pearl of northern China,'' the
360-square kilometer (135-sq mile) lake has been plundered for industrial
and agricultural production and drinking water for the region's growing
population.
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- A severe drought compounded the problem this year and
the lake is unlikely to survive without a massive canal project to begin
next year that will divert water from the mighty Yangtze river that meanders
across central China, the official said.
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- ``Transferring water from several nearby reservoirs can
temporarily solve the water strain here, but if the current situation goes
on, even the reservoirs will dry up next year,'' he said.
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- ``We place all our hopes in the south-to-north water
transfer project,'' he said.
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- Deadly Unrest Over Water
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- Lakes reduced to dust and rivers that trickle dry before
reaching the sea are emblems of a water shortage that is gripping vast
areas of China .
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- Civil unrest has erupted several times in recent months
over the precious resource, including a deadly riot by villagers in July
in Shandong after officials cut off water supplies from a reservoir they
had used to irrigate crops.
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- In August, six people were accidentally killed when officials
in the southern province of Guangdong blew up a water channel to prevent
a neighboring county from diverting water to a new power station.
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- Three canal networks to bring Yangtze water to parched
northern cities are expected to be completed in 2010.
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- The Baoding official said he was looking to the central
route, which will divert water to Beijing and Hebei from the Danjiangkou
Reservoir in Hubei, to save Baiyangdian.
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