Nearly 1.8 million people in southeast China's Fujian
Province are short of drinking water as the region suffers from
its most serious drought since 1938.?
?"The drought is expected to ease as Typhoon Morakot moves
to the southeastern part of the province from the sea on Monday,''
said Liu Aimin, deputy director of the Fujian Meteorological
Observatory.
"Central and southeastern parts of the province are forecast to
receive about 100 millimeters of long-awaited rain from typhoon
Morakot, which will alleviate the heat and drought,'' said Liu.
However, the drought in northern and northwestern Fujian shows
no signs of easing as the typhoon is expected to dissipate quickly
once it hits land, having little impact on the province's
interior.
A total of 810,000 hectares of farmland are currently in
drought.
Meanwhile, Shanghai can expect some relief from its summer
heatwave in the next two days.
The city has experienced 16 extremely hot days with the
temperature surpassing 35C.
According to Xu Jialiang, a senior engineer with the Shanghai
Meteorological Bureau, the city has not had such a hot spell in
half a century.
Temperatures could drop with the possible arrival of showers
tomorrow, but the effects are likely to be limited, he added.
The number of outpatients in Shanghai's major hospitals has
risen by a fifth compared with last year, and most suffering from
heat stroke.
As residents drink more water, take more showers and stay
indoors with their air conditioning running, the consumption of
water and electricity is increasing substantially.
Shanghai Water Company engineers point out the downtown area is
now using around six million cubic meters of water a day.
But they said the system is still capable of providing 20 per
cent more water if the need arises.
The huge increase in electricity consumption, however, is posing
a major challenge to the city's power network.
Consumption has peaked at 13.44 million kilowatts (kw), one
million kw higher than its designed generating capacity.
At present, more than 1,000 local companies face power
restrictions and some 300 companies have had to re-arrange work
schedules to avoid the peak electricity consumption period.
The municipality also announced all landscape lighting around
the city will be temporarily suspended.
Hot weather has forced local governments to take all sorts of
measures.
For example, in Hangzhou, capital of east China's Zhejiang
Province, 16 air raid shelters are being opened from 9 am to 11
pm every day for local residents to escape the heat.
"It is much cooler here than in our home,'' media reports quoted
a man surnamed Zhang as saying.
(China Daily August 5, 2003)