China struggles to solve water shortage

Plan floated to bring water from Tibet to northern region

Northern China is seriously short of water. Due to rapid urbanization and water pollution coupled with drought, the region’s water shortage is getting worse every year. To solve this problem, the Chinese authorities are reportedly considering plans to bring water from snow and glaciers in Tibet to north China via canal.

China has about 2,800 billion cubic meters of water, the fourth-largest supply in the world, but the per-capita average water resources are ranked at 121st, with merely 2,300 cubic meters per person, a fourth of the world’s average figure. Adding to the problem are environmental pollution and drought. In addition, China cannot prevent water from being wasted because of insufficient waste water treatment.

Experts in China predict that in 2030, when the nation’s population is expected to exceed 1.6 billion, China will have 700 - 800 billion cubic meters of water, or only 1,750 cubic meters per person. Under such circumstances, in order to resolve the serious water shortage, China is considering a plan to construct a canal linking Tibet and Tianjin, instead of a prior plan to draw the water of the Yangtze River toward the Yellow River, according to the latest edition of Hong Kong’s weekly magazine, Yazhou Zhoukan.

Tibet has considerable water resources, so a former official of the Chinese Ministry of Water Resources (MWR) mapped out a scheme at the end of the 1980s to construct a canal linking Tibet and Tianjin. The leadership of China at that time, including Jiang Zemin and Zhu Rongji, showed keen interest for the plan.

However, some experts raise concerns over the project because the construction of a canal may have harmful effects, such as damage to the environment and destruction of delicate ecosystems.