State media has published a new set pictures of the lingering drought in Yunnan. Now into its third year, it has touched nearly 8 million people and become part of daily life, as the photograph above, taken in a village in Shilin County, shows. More than 3 million people are short of drinking water. Water levels in reservoirs in some parts of the province are at their lowest in a decade. The photo below shows a reservoir in Shilin County that has dried out completely. Crops on more than 130,000 hectares of farmland have withered. A significant emergency relief effort is underway across the province.
Last month, officials said that more than 3 million people across the country were short of drinking water because of drought. After Yunnan, the most serious drought is in Inner Mongolia. Gansu and Hubei have also been affected.
Meanwhile, a forest wildfire on the outskirts of Yunnan’s provincial capital, Kunming, that raged for two days at the beginning of the week before being brought under control has flared up again. Update: It has since been brought under control (pictures via Xinhua) but a second forest fire in the region has taken hold. Yunnan is China’s second most heavily forested province.
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