China has announced a billion dollars in emergency water aid to ease its most severe drought in 60 years, as the United Nations warned of a threat to the harvest of the world's biggest wheat producer.
Beijing has also promised to use its grain reserves to reduce the pressure on global food prices, which have surged in the past year to record highs due to the floods in Australia and a protracted dry spell in Russia.
The desperate measures were evident at Baita reservoir in Shandong – one of several key agricultural provinces afflicted by four months without rain. With nearby crops turning yellow, a mechanical digger cut a crude, open-cast well into the dried-up bed of the reservoir. Muddy water from the five-metre deep pit was pumped up to the surface via a hose that snaked past a fishing boat stranded on the cracked earth.
As the water spluttered on to his wheat field, farmer Liu Baojin expressed concern the support may have come too late. Despite the emergency well digging and partial compensation from the government, he fears he may have to seek work in the city if his harvest fails.
"I guess a third of my crops have already died," he said. "I'm very worried. I've never seen such a dry spell."
The problems are compounded by the growing water demands of cities and industry. On the outskirts of Sishui – which translates as Four Waters due to its historic abundance of rivers and sprints – villagers complain that they are not allowed to use the Si river that runs past their homes because the water is earmarked for the Huajin paper mill and an artificial lake in a nearby urban development.
"We can't use our own water. The local officials want to keep it so they can show a 'green face' to the big-shot leaders from Beijing," said a peanut and cotton farmer who gave the surname Liu. "We are very angry. But we are afraid to complain."
Local newspapers have been filled with stories of the drought's impact on the "wheat basket" provinces of Henan, Anhui and Hunan. About 2.6 million people and 2.8 million livestock are affected. To induce precipitation, the army and metereological officials have fired cloud-seeding chemicals into the sky.
A light overnight fall of snow raised hopes that the drought may be about to break, but the Shandong Climate Centre said it stopped at 0.4mm – only enough to dust the fields.
"It's too little to make any difference," said Kong Dekun, who farms land near the mythical birthplace of Confucius in Fuzidong. "We should have had at least two big snowfalls by now."
The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation issued an alert earlier this week (pdf). "The ongoing drought is potentially a very serious problem," it said, noting that the affected area of 5.16 million hectares representd two-thirds of China's wheat production.
This has added to upward pressure on global wheat prices, which surged 76% last year due to a combination of speculation, rising demand and climatic impacts on production in Canada, Australia, Europe and Russia.
China bucked the trend with a record harvest in 2010, but the lack of rain – even by the standards of the dry season – has prompted concerns and price speculation that have pushed domestic wheat prices to record highs.
"This drought is unusual," said Kisan Gunjal, food emergency officer at the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. "There is not such a great problem now as the crop is dormant, but we must keep in mind that if it remains dry or if temperatures in February go below the frost kill level – then this could be a significant event."
Rising food prices are said to have contributed to the unrest in Egypt and Tunisia. The Chinese government is trying to head off a destabilising level of stress over water, which is arguably the country's biggest environmental problem.
Premier Wen Jiabao has visited Shandong to promise help for the farmers. This week, his government unveiled a 6.7bn yuan ($1bn) package of measures to divert water, construct emergency wells and improve irrigation.
Last month, it announced a doubling of spending on water conservation to 4tn yuan (£400bn) over the next ten years, along with a first annual cap on water at 670 billion cubic metres. Huge sums are also being spent on water diversion projects, well digging and desalination plants.
Comments in chronological order (Total 90 comments)
11 February 2011 11:12AM
"I guess a third of my crops have already died," he said. "I'm very worried. I've never seen such a dry spell."
I'm also very worried.
There can be no denial of food. Without food we starve. Water is essential to life, so these increasing droughts are a threat to our survival. Unprecedented extreme weather events are increasing. You can deny the the fault lies with climate change if you like, but it doe not stop the problem.
Desalination is not the answer either. This energy-intensive process can only make matters worse on the long term.
I cannot offer any solutions right now, sorry. Enjoy your meal.
11 February 2011 11:34AM
I did my dissertation on global water resources and China was subsidising the farmers for potatoes back in 2006 because of drought.
Nothing I have seen since I submitted it in 2007 has changed, apart from the end of the Australian drought now replaced by other as bad and destructive natural disasters, and the predicted models I studied in the climate change report released that year are becoming scarily accurate.
Food production is either going to have to relocate to regions where it can be successful, people will have to eat less or there needs to be fewer people. Only one of those is viable based on the stupidity of Humans.
11 February 2011 11:48AM
There are still a lot of regions that could contribute significantly if their agriculture was not lacking the necessary investments. The Ukraine for example remains a small player altough it could become the bread basket of Europe again.
Somehow there must be a solution to the increasing demand over the next decade. One of the first measures should be stopping the roll-out of E10 petrol (10% ethanol). The production of ethanol uses vast amounts of arable land which is now - once again - needed for food production.
11 February 2011 11:51AM
Chinese scientist have pointed out that the wet winter of 2008 and the dry winter of 2011 are directly linked to the advent of El Nino and La Nina.
11 February 2011 11:53AM
The the fall comes, we're going to hit the ground pretty fucking hard.
11 February 2011 11:59AM
Are you sure about the £400 billion that China wants to invest in water conservation? What a number! This looks like a massive bonanza for the companies involved in the water industry.
@Halo572 I would be interested in reading your diss
11 February 2011 12:08PM
Perhaps now that voters realise that there are fluctuations in weather that food stockpiles in Europe are not such a bad thing in the long term.
There are vast areas of desert and vast volumes of sea water. As population continues to grow it is time for more resources to transport fresh water to the desert. The deserts are at higher levels than sea level. Perhaps converting the water to steam and pumping the steam to be transported to the remote areas to be condensed to water is not beyond the capabilities of engineers to day.
11 February 2011 12:10PM
What we don't know is to what degree this prolonged drought is the result of "Climate Wars" between the US and China. What we do know is that the technology exists to conduct such wars (HAARP for example) and that the US administration sees China as the greatest threat to its global empire.
11 February 2011 12:11PM
@Halo572, you seem knowledgable about this. I thought that the drought in Australia was in the South-East, and the floods were in the North East. In other words, the floods had not relieved the drought.
11 February 2011 12:16PM
Running out of oil will be very inconvenient ...
But running out of water will be fatal.
We seem to be hell-bent on making both of these happen at once.
11 February 2011 12:18PM
bluecloud: you are all doom and gloom. There is an abundance of free energy - the sun. There are parts of the world where this energy can be harnassed. The UK is not one of them.
11 February 2011 12:26PM
The Chinese seem to be doing their bit, but considering the large amount of wasted farm land in Zimbabwe, since Mugabe's land re-distribution, it might be an idea to get some experts down there to attempt to restore what was once the bread basket of Africa and get some food production started again there, Mugabe seems to be well in with the Chinese since their diamond deal
11 February 2011 12:47PM
Perhaps the vast sums paid out under the Common Agricultural policy of the E.U. needs a little revision. I have heard numerous stories of farmers filling in the forms, ticking all the boxes and living off the grants rather than than the actual farming. certainly in the village I used to live in, it is possible to compare the amount of grants received by the largest landowner ( vast ) with the general standard of farming ( poor )
If the EEC is going to pay grants at all, it should be for food actually sent to market.
11 February 2011 12:59PM
La Nina is expected to last well into 2011 although one must take the predictions with a pinch of salt. The dryer colder air will probably exacerbate the drought problems in parts of China. I am sure the Chinese will release part of their grain reserves and have some irrigation in place for the growing season to mitigate this. The Chinese are pragmatists and will do what it takes, they have deep pockets.
11 February 2011 1:01PM
£400 billion is a big bill for having thrown away water and ecosystems so I hope the spending will include an effort that goes beyond technical fixes aimed at the most obvious symptomatic effects. Such an effort needs to look 'upstream towards the sources' of the problems with water and food production. The reward for making this effort would be to have a chance at reversing the problems and also to ensure that technical spending has a net positive impact and doesn't just give temporary relief whist making long term supplies more unstable.
China is in a strong position to make this upstream thinking effort, compared to the West. They have an established 'circular economy' vision which has not yet been implemented but offers a new growth model where people, nature and the economy progress together rather than in conflict. China's Great Green Wall of new forests seems to understand that the loss of nature must be rapidly reversed. Similarly, agriculture could systematically grow topsoils rather than lose them. And remove toxins rather than add them. Biochar is one simple cheap carbon-negative cooking/heating technique that can be practiced by households to build soils, purify water and reverse climate instability. Much more is possible.
All that is needed is the kind of ambitious planning and widespread implementation that China knows it can do. If China can avoid the impending flood of Western technical fix advisors and contractors they could before long be showing us a few tricks!
11 February 2011 1:27PM
More water can not be created, it's in a closed cycle.
The problem is what it's used for, where, and by whom. Is it more important that a few get rich or that we all eat and survive.
Salination is no longer creeping but racing. The soil is being used to desalinate the water. Stop irrigation.
Grow food for people instead of for animals - ten times more and better protein direct.
Live where there is water and share it fairly. Don't steal it from others.
Israelis from Palestinians, Los Angelenos from First Nations etc.
What has everyone got against plain old-fashioned common sense nowadays? 1 + 1 = 2
11 February 2011 1:36PM
amoamasamat
'There are vast areas of desert and vast volumes of sea water. As population continues to grow it is time for more resources to transport fresh water to the desert. The deserts are at higher levels than sea level. Perhaps converting the water to steam and pumping the steam to be transported to the remote areas to be condensed to water is not beyond the capabilities of engineers to day.'
What resources did you have in mind for transporting fresh water to the desert, as peak oil takes us into future energy penury? Do you have any idea what it takes in energy to keep Las Vegas going?
Re 'free' solar energy, what matters is NET available energy, i.e the energy you have at your disposal once you deduct the energy it took to get it (including mining, manufacture and transport of everything used in the process. Solar will produce a lot of net energy in certain places - it won't replace oil, in quantitative terms, anywhere.
11 February 2011 1:45PM
amoamasamat
I'm feeling a bit dispondent today, but I think I am being realistic in being worried. The sun is not going to help us much considering our basic needs for energy are based on millions of years of stored energy in the form of fossil fuels. As for water supplies, it's a growing problem, which will not be solved by throwing money at it.
If you really want gloom, look up the Olduvia Theory, or visit Reading town centre on a Friday night.
11 February 2011 1:54PM
I cannot understand why articles like this are categorised "environment" and then dumped into the Green Bin.
This article is GENERAL WORLD NEWS. Its environmental content is substantial, but that should not consign it to the attention of the segregated environmentalists.
Journalism cannot be allowed to specialise overly without damaging its reach.
11 February 2011 2:17PM
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11 February 2011 2:45PM
I wonder though, how many of the natural lakes and rivers in China might have eased various droughts were it not for the fact that they are polluted beyond use. A prime example is in Yunnan where last year farmers faced a very serious drought despite a handful of large lakes in the province. Lake Dian Chi, the 8th largest in China and one of the largest in Asia, is now completely unfit for even agricultural or industrial uses.
Sad.
11 February 2011 2:51PM
@HorseCart - it's both. See the tagging taxonomy to the right of the story. It's on the world front (World news and comment from the Guardian | World news | guardian.co.uk) as well as the environment one (Environment news, comment and analysis from the Guardian | Environment | guardian.co.uk).
11 February 2011 2:52PM
trade you food for your rare earth minerals ?
11 February 2011 3:09PM
Sign of things to come.Sceptics beware.
11 February 2011 3:11PM
Selfish people having too many aeroplane holidays,and too many cars,we need a quick change here,before its too late,a bit like the credit crunch they never see it comming.
11 February 2011 4:00PM
Very Bad Times are just around the corner for almost all of us. And those few who are mostly responsible for the Very Bad Times will escape the worst of it. Same old story.
11 February 2011 5:04PM
Got nukes? You always run out of power and water at the same time. Perhaps instead of paving North Africa with solar collectors we should build gas-cooled-fast reactors (GCFR) in Germany and Italy and pump lots of water to North Africa. Have to mine the 200 Mt-phosphate-rock/y because North Africa soil is depleted in mineral fertilizers. The byproduct uranium will fuel the GGFRs. Or the gas-cooled piles could use a U233-thorium cycle and slow neutrons. Or CANDUs burning thorium, but they need cooling water. Then there would be enough food for 10 billions, drought or no, meat consumption or no. Oh...I forgot...useful energy or environmental policy is not allowed.
11 February 2011 5:05PM
Cheer up folks it is the start of the weekend.
11 February 2011 5:30PM
climatsecaz
Unfortunately, this is too simplistic.
If your logic was correct then by reducing the number of cars and planes (and by consequence the holidays people take in them) the storages of water and food would disappear. Obviously, that will have little impact because the underlying problem is too many people concentrated in resource scare places.
The idea that if I decide not to holiday in Iceland this year that I am going to alleviate a water shortage in China is more than ridiculous and only serves to deflect from the real problem which only the Chinese can deal with - reducing their population.
Equally, the idea that the whole world population is to be treated as a singular whole is an equal deflection away from the real problem - large populations in concentrated resource limited regions.
For example, if a Norwegian in the water rich Norway was to stop drinking a little less water it would have absolutely no impact on the drought problems of Australia or China. All that happens is that the water that s/he does not consume pours into the sea via one of the ample rivers. If the same person had 5 more children, again it would technically increase the world population but have little real impact because those children would be born into a resource rich environment. The scenario is reversed in places like China or India where natural resources are already close to the limit.
No, the horrid fact is that in nations like China or India etc where high population is coupled to limited natural resources there is only one answer and that is drastic reduction in population (the reduction in planes and cars will follow my friend).
11 February 2011 5:41PM
Israel,
Can you show China how desert-farming is done?
11 February 2011 6:12PM
This is the abstract of a Wiley review Drought under Global Warming from 19th October. The whole article is well worth looking at.
This article reviews recent literature on drought of the last millennium, followed by an update on global aridity changes from 1950 to 2008. Projected future aridity is presented based on recent studies and our analysis of model simulations. Dry periods lasting for years to decades have occurred many times during the last millennium over, for example, North America, West Africa, and East Asia. These droughts were likely triggered by anomalous tropical sea surface temperatures (SSTs), with La Niña-like SST anomalies leading to drought in North America, and El-Niño-like SSTs causing drought in East China. Over Africa, the southward shift of the warmest SSTs in the Atlantic and warming in the Indian Ocean are responsible for the recent Sahel droughts. Local feedbacks may enhance and prolong drought. Global aridity has increased substantially since the 1970s due to recent drying over Africa, southern Europe, East and South Asia, and eastern Australia. Although El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), tropical Atlantic SSTs, and Asian monsoons have played a large role in the recent drying, recent warming has increased atmospheric moisture demand and likely altered atmospheric circulation patterns, both contributing to the drying. Climate models project increased aridity in the 21st century over most of Africa, southern Europe and the Middle East, most of the Americas, Australia, and Southeast Asia. Regions like the United States have avoided prolonged droughts during the last 50 years due to natural climate variations, but might see persistent droughts in the next 20–50 years. Future efforts to predict drought will depend on models' ability to predict tropical SSTs. WIREs Clim Change 2011 2 45–65 DOI: 10.1002/wcc.81
11 February 2011 6:16PM
Bluecloud
'If you really want gloom, look up the Olduvia Theory, or visit Reading town centre on a Friday night.'
Blimey I though this one (http://canada.theoildrum.com/node/2516) was gloomy until I looked at your Olduvia link. The Oil Drun one has excess deaths peaking at about 200m around 2050, with population down to about 1.5bn by around 2080.
Whatever the exact figures turn out to be, I wish I'd known back in the 80s before having kids - only 2 but that's 2 too many if this is what's in front of them.
11 February 2011 9:37PM
Hadley Cells.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadley_cell
As temperature rises they will spread away from the equator and take the deserts with them.
Oh dear.
11 February 2011 9:55PM
In a way it's good that another of the world's major polluters is being hit so hard. Australia has had its droughts and forest fires; the US has had the same, if not so hard. Now it's rural China. But are the guys in the cities who make decisions about CO2 emissions listening? Or are they just so deaf that they cannot hear?
11 February 2011 10:54PM
Another obvious solution- discourage meat consumption. It's incredibly wasteful of water...not only does the grain for cattle need watering, but of course the cattle themselves, and so on. it's a lousy and un-necessary way to get protein into our bodies. in this day and age with tasty alternatives there's no reason for this practice to continue.
No to mention the animals would thank us for it...:)
12 February 2011 12:09AM
Hmmm strange absence of deniers from this thread...I wonder why?
I feel a bit like I imagine a foot soldier in the Middle Ages facing English longbowmen for the first time might have felt, and wondering what that cloud of little sticks in the sky moving towards me are and what is going to happen when they land.
Start thinking vegetarian diet now.
12 February 2011 12:19AM
I suggest people get in their gardens and start becoming a bit more self sufficient..roses or spuds? Least we get the rain...
12 February 2011 12:27AM
@tteng
yes, Israel certainly can.
First, you steal as much land as possible from the locals, divert the water supply so that most of the locals are denied water, then use the water to grow crops! easy -peasy!
can't see how this will work in China though
12 February 2011 12:31AM
the lack of water is symptomatic of over abundant people: irrigation and industry are sucking off water from food production, but there are just too many people on the planet for reliance on natural management of resources.
population continues to press against resources, malthus was right then and now, and no solution is possible without population control.
only china has attempted to face this reality. other nations shrug their shoulders, "too hard," or even continue to promote 'growth.' so humanity will continue to 'grow,' until it 'dies.'
12 February 2011 12:49AM
Menotti is on to it. Climate change is changing the rainfall distribution. Areas that were once productive will no longer be that way.
This has happened before Ancient Egypt used to be the worlds bread basket until the earth warmed and the rainfall moved to the other side of the Mediterranean.
In Australia weather conditions have moved 2 degrees to the South and rain that once fell on Southern Australia now falls in the Southern Ocean.
I live in big river country some of Australia's most flood prone land, but we didn't get any floods this time, to the north and the south it flooded but around here it has been relatively dry.
12 February 2011 1:03AM
It is seemingly worrisome, but everyone in the world will see how the drought will be miraculously turned into harvest by the end of the year. This is today's China that is able to turn an unbelievable into believable, attributing to its political system and efficient and effective state governance.
12 February 2011 1:28AM
I'm sitting in my living room in Beijing watching CCTV News, and it says a lot about the severity of this drought that they're reporting on the successful grassroots revolution in Egypt, but not this. They know what makes Chinese people overthrow their leaders. Fat politicians and emaciated farmers.
12 February 2011 2:37AM
AdamVaughan
Can we not replace:
Life & Style > Make do and Mend
Travel > Dig for Peace
?
I guess I can only ask before it is imposed on us.
12 February 2011 3:17AM
Huh? I live in Shandong province right in the middle. There is a drought, but then again there is always barely any precipitation other than a mild dusting of snow from November until March, it's always brownish yellow and dead all winter, nothing unusual, it's the local climate in the eight years I've been here at least.
If there's no rain during the March-August rainy season then I'll be satisfied that there really is severe drought.
12 February 2011 4:33AM
Stop whining.
You know what the problem is.
We all need to stop using so much stuff
12 February 2011 5:47AM
Chinese timely measures to tackle drought and save wheat production are laudable.
Here is a FAO Report on the Subject:
The FAO has just released a special briefing on wheat production in China, through its Global Information and Early Warning System on Food and Agriculture (GIEWS). “A severe winter drought in the North China Plain may put wheat production at risk,” said the FAO. “Substantially below-normal rainfall since October 2010 in the North China Plain, the country’s main winter wheat producing area, puts at risk the winter wheat crop to be harvested later in the month of June.”
Low precipitation resulting in diminished snow cover has reduced the protection of dormant wheat plants against frost kill temperatures (usually below -18°C) during winter months from December to February. Low precipitation and thin snow cover have also jeopardized the soil moisture availability for the post-dormant growing period. Thus, the ongoing drought is potentially a serious problem.
FAO’s GIEWS said that the main affected provinces include Shandong, Jiangsu, Henan, Hebei and Shanxi, which together represent about 60% of the area planted and two-thirds of the national wheat production. According to official estimates some 5.16 million hectares out of the total of about 14 million hectares under winter wheat may have been affected in these provinces. The drought has reportedly affected some 2.57 million people and 2.79 million livestock due to the shortages of drinking water.
Dr.A.Jagadeesh Nellore(AP),India
12 February 2011 6:15AM
Too many people, not enough resources...nine billion will not happen.
12 February 2011 6:50AM
Let them eat cake. Oh they can't afford to. I love how the masters of the universe have turned to commodities these days having fucked up with derivatives.
So not content with handing an excuse to people like Osbourne to savage social services we are all going to have to eat cardboard as well.
Better wheel out Madame guillotine.
In fact eat a banker..... Nice and fat, soaked in Mouton Rothschild.... Tasty.
12 February 2011 6:53AM
If it's the start of apocalypse I'm going to need cake. I'd better start saving up.
12 February 2011 7:07AM
This is the century when humans discover that we aren't as rich as we thought we were. Water, oil, arable land, and a long list of other things and processes aren't really enough to meet human desire. Not to mention climate change.
But our minds and institutions are still fixated on short-term gain. Like hypnotised chickens, we stare at the monster that will kill us, but do nothing.