H2-whoa! Twenty lakes vanish a year
- Source: Global Times
- [08:03 November 03 2009]
- Comments
By Deng Jingyin in Wuhan
More than 1,000 lakes have disappeared in China in the past half century, and more than 80 percent of lakes along the lower reach of the Yangtze River have been troubled by algae outbreaks, officials warned Monday at the beginning of the 13th World Lake Conference in central Hubei Province.
With the theme of "rehabilitation of our lakes," the four-day gathering of more than 1,400 environmental experts and scholars from over 40 countries will focus on challenges facing the world's lakes.
One of the key questions will be in regard to handling China's problem of polluted drinking water, which has actually gotten worse as a result of the country's rapid growth.
"Deterioration of water quality in lakes hasn't been controlled yet … Water quality of some lakes has descended to class V (seriously polluted) or even worse, resulting in algal bloom and oxygen deficiency," Minister of Water Resources Chen Lei said at the opening ceremony of the conference.
He pointed out that most of the lakes in southeast China are suffering from eutrophication, a state when the waters have a large influx of mineral and organic nutrients, resulting in excessive algae growth that suffocates other creatures in the water.
"Among 43 lakes we investigated, 27 lakes have been eutrophicated, and 12 lakes, including Taihu Lake, Chaohu Lake and Dianchi Lake, are in a severe eutrophication state," he added.
Taihu, located near Shanghai, is China's third-largest lake. Chaohu, in Anhui Province, is the fifth-largest.
Disappearing bodies
Under the dual effects of climate change and human activities, lakes are witnessing a continuous fall in water levels and decrease in fishable areas, experts said.
"The number of lakes has been reduced by 1,000 in 50 years, and there are 20 lakes on average disappearing in China every year," Zhang Yongchun, an expert from the Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, told the Global Times Monday.
The country lost 9,570 square kilometers of water area, and 51.6 billion cubic meters of water-storage volume, in the past half century.
There are more than 2,300 lakes larger than 1 square kilometer in China.
Hubei, once known as "the province of a thousand lakes," now has only 2,440 square kilometers of lakes, or a third of the water area it had in the 1950s.
The water level at Poyang Lake, a large freshwater body, is also shrinking rapidly.
"It's a result of human activities, such as reclaiming the lake for farmland, over-drilling of water, and diverting river routes recklessly," Yu Hui, a professor from the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences, said in an interview with the Global Times at the conference.
The deforestation around the upper reaches of the Yangtze River has brought large amounts of sand down into the lakes, which also reduces the water levels in the lakes.
