The water level of the Yangtze River decreases by 2cm every 5 years.
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A study found that the Yangtze River (Changjiang), where about one third of China’s population and economy is concentrated, is drying up. Over the long term, it is likely to have a negative impact on the Chinese economy.
According to the Hong Kong South China Morning Post (SCMP) on the 1st, Nening and colleagues of the Priority Geographic Information Research Center under the Ministry of Education in China wrote a paper in the latest issue of the journal Advances in Water Science. It is said that it is gradually lowering.
The authors drew this conclusion by analyzing the water level of the Yangtze River since the 1980s based on measurements from ground observatories and satellite images. They assessed that climate change such as warming affected 80% of the water level change in the Yangtze River, and 20% of human factors such as urban development were attributable. About 1,000 lakes along the Yangtze River have disappeared since the 1980s.
About 460 million people live in the area around the Yangtze River, which is the largest river in China and covers a total of 6,300 km. In addition, the gross domestic product (GDP) of the Yangtze River basin accounts for about a third of China’s total GDP.
The decline in the water level on the Yangtze River could also affect economic activity in China as a whole. China is currently working on drawing water from the Yangtze River to the northern Yellow River and around Beijing through a project called’Namsu-bei Dynasty’. However, the water in the Yangtze River, which should become a source of water, is decreasing.
Along with this, the authors pointed out that warming is leading to more frequent flooding and droughts by increasing changes in the Yangtze River water. In the summer of last year, more than 70 million people were flooded in China due to the flood in 20 years. However, with drought in the winter, the lower Yangtze River basin is currently suffering from severe water shortages.
“The concentration of pollutants can increase (when the river dries) and can extinct species more susceptible to pollution,” said Shezhichai, a researcher at the Wuhan Institute of Aquatic Biology, affiliated with the Chinese Academy of Sciences. “The water in the Yangtze River is now scarce. “I don’t, but the effect can appear over a long period of time.”
/Beijing = Correspondent Soomoon Choi [email protected]
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