China Floods May Be Sign of Wider Problems
The floods now besetting China may be related to the country's trajectory of economic development, set by the Communist Party, which has pursued GDP growth at massive environmental cost and consequence, according to experts interviewed by The Epoch Times.
Southwestern China, stricken by severe drought in the first half of the year, is now suffering from flooding—along with three in four Chinese provinces, the worst since 2000.
Water resource experts believe that drought and flood are related, and that both are caused by water loss and soil erosion, which leads to a rupture of the ecological balance.
With thousands of potential and confirmed deaths so far, the heavy rain is expected to continue, putting more pressure on reservoirs and other flood control projects, according to forecasts by China's National Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarter.
Dr. Wang Weiluo, a land-planning expert, has published numerous articles on China's water resource issues for decades, and is a leading expert in the field. He stresses that excessive development of river projects, single-minded pursuit of GDP growth, the destruction of virgin forests, and especially the destruction of the Tibetan Plateau (which he considers China's "water-tower"), are the largest contributing factors to the country's droughts and floods.
Water Resources at an Impasse
"Water is the lifeblood of economic development," Wang said in an interview with The Epoch Times. "Today the issue of China's water resources has become a bottleneck and the most difficult part of China's economic development."
A project of communist proportions was conceived by the Party's Academy of Sciences to attempt to resolve the issue. Announced at the National People's Congress by Chinese Communist Party (CCP) member He Zuoxiu, the South-North Water Transfer Project was meant to do what the name implies, and thereby "revive the Chinese nation" and double the size of its farmland.
China's future lies in its water. But after the drought in the southwest during the first half of the year, many note that its water resources have reached an impasse. "The Chinese nation has reached a most dangerous time—no water, and hence no agriculture," in Wang's words.
Northern China experienced severe drought in 2009, which the massive (and still unfinished) South-North Water Transfer Project was supposed to solve. It is planned to divert water from the upper, middle, and lower reaches of the Yangtze River to meet the development requirements of northwest and northern China.
But as a result of the drought, the Yangtze's water resources have been heavily taxed. Water resource experts in China are turning their sights on the water from the Tibetan Plateau.But the Tibetan Plateau is not a solution either, Wang says.
"The worst destruction to the ecosystem in China may occur in the Tibetan Plateau," Wang says. He argues that China's water tower has been destroyed by the regime's economic growth policies.
Under the banner of "developing Tibet," Wang says, the regime sends officials, who belong to the Han ethnic group and have lived outside of Tibet their whole lives, on several year-long assignments. As such, they concern themselves only with short-term accomplishments to gain promotions.
Shortcuts to economic growth are shortcuts to death for the prairie, however. Harmful activities include gold mining, jade mining, harvesting Chinese medicine, and harvesting native plants. (An example is Nostoc flagelliforme, a special long-threaded moss, which can be used as a health food.)
According to Wang, officials divided the pasture area into plots and forced Tibetan herdsmen into leases—an entirely foreign approach to their traditional way of life.
Generally the animals have the instinct to "graze only on the fresh grown grass sprouts, but not the roots." This causes no damage to the pasture. "When they have finished with the grass sprouts, they move on where they can find fresh new leaves. The next year, the herds will come back to where they started and the new grass leaves are again ready for them to consume," Wang explains.
With officials having forced Tibetan herdsmen to settle the herds in one place, however, when the animals have finished eating the grass sprouts they have no choice but to start eating the roots. Desertification is then inevitable.
Previously, the Tibetan grassland was so thick that even the rats could not dig holes in it, Wang says, but now they dominate the area. The underground water level has dropped as a result.
"In fact, the Han officials' stationary [grazing] policy has failed several times in history and has caused the collapse of dynasties. The Han Dynasty is an example."
Wang believes that after such large-scale damage it is nearly impossible to return the Tibetan Plateau to its original state. This is partly because of the cold climate in the region requiring the plants to have extra long growth cycles.
Unsustainable Growth
In the meantime, the regime's development shows no sign of stopping: hydropower stations are now being built, which seriously diminish water resources.
Experts say that generally the usage rate of a river should not exceed 15 percent of its volume, five percent being the ideal. According to Wang, however, the usage rate of many rivers in China is 100 percent, meaning that the capacity of the reservoirs has reached the flowing capacity of the river.
The Yellow River, whose usage rate is over 100 percent, has completely dried up in many areas. When the river runs dry a small amount of water is usually released from the reservoirs to artificially maintain a flow.
Liaohe River in northeast China and the Haihe River near Beijing are examples. In the case of the Haihe, instead of the river running into the sea, now salt water often flows back into the river. The Yongding River, also close to Beijing, too dried up from overuse.
Rivers have a self-cleansing ability, Wang said; but reservoirs destroy this.
He illustrated China's river predicament with a vivid example: "We all know that the kidneys cleanse the human body. If one sells one's kidney for profit, it is just like the profit from hydropower stations. Since one has lost one's cleansing organ, he has to buy a machine to clean his blood. The same situation applies to the river where water filtration plants have to be built."
In the Chinese context, this is all in pursuit of GDP growth. "A person with a healthy kidney does not need a blood-cleansing machine, but produces no GDP. He sells his kidney to increase the GDP. Then he buys a blood-cleansing machine, which even increases the GDP more," Wang said.
"The Chinese regime's way of calculating things is different from that of other countries."