By: Jonathan Watts
Summary: China, the largest wheat producer in the world, has recently paid one billion dollars to help with China's worst drought in 60 years. The Baita resevoir in Shandong, one of the key agricultural provinces, has gone four months without rain. A farmer had to dig a well, but when he finished it was already too late, a third of his crops had already died. On the outskirts of Sishui, villagers can't use the water from the river that is right next to their homes, because it is ment to be used by the Huajin paper mill and an artificial lake in a nearby urban development. These villagers are upset by the fact that they can't use their own water. Wheat prices have increased by 76% because of this drought.
Opinion: I think that this water drought is horrible and that it is probably because of overuse of water. I feel sorry for the villagers in China that are being so poorly affected by this drought. After reading this article I will try my hardest to use as little water as possible.
Questions:
1. What is the main cause of this drought?
2. How was this billion dollars worth of water used?
3. How much money has China lost because of this drought? (besides the billion dollars)
Opinion:
ReplyDeleteLike anywhere, knowing that people are going without water is very sad. People, myself included, tend to think only about Africa when they hear about a water crisis. The truth is that they are going on all around the world. Hopefully a water crisis of this magnitude will never make its way to the USA.
Expansion:
This article shows that the water that China has is pretty polluted.
http://www.china.org.cn/video/2011-10/14/content_23622615.htm
More Questions:
1. Is the water crisis worse in China or Africa?
2. Does global warming have to do with the cause of the drought?
Opinion/Reflection:
ReplyDeleteI think that this is horrible. This is starting to happen in a lot of places around the world but people dont know. Most people only know that there is a water crisis in Africa, they dont realize it is starting to happen in other places too. I know that if this happens in here, we will have to change the way we live dramatically.
Questions:
1.) Can this spread over to America or will it stay out in china?
2.) While this happened, did they cut down on their use of water to save what they did have?
3.) Should they make a law that you can only use so much water so they wont get into their water crisis again?
Opinion/Reflection:
ReplyDeleteIt is sad to know that China is havinga severe drought and that they had to spend 1 billion dollars on getting water. Also that the price of wheat went up 76% and that is the most used crop in China. It is also sad how one man dug a hole for a well to try and get water for his crops and by the time he finished the well one third of his crops died. that would be like somebody taking on third of your monthly pay check because that is how the farmers make all of their money. in class we learned about a drought in Maine and a big company was taking the water near them and they didnt get any. And that is like what happened in that place in china the farmers had a drought and they could not get the water from the river near them.
Questions:
Is the drought in China worse than the water crisis in Africa?
What did they do with the 1 billion dollars with of water?
Did major companies try to cut back on their water use or did they not care?
Opinion/Reflection:
ReplyDeleteThis article reminds me of Emmy's article about China's water table levels dropping dramatically. In that article, it explained how China's government is trying to find a more efficient way to use and manage their water before reducing the wheat growing. But it seems like they have no other choice now.
Also, the fact that those villagers are not allowed to use their own water is ridiculous. Without water, it is impossible to live. These villagers should come first, not the papermills.
Questions:
1. If China's government reduces wheat growing, will that help with the drought?
2. Are other countries making an effort to help these villages?
3. Aren't digging wells (like the farmer did in the article) a bad idea since China is trying to limit the use of water tables?