英文原文

Worst Drought in Half Century Shrivels the Wheat Belt of China

Northern China is dry in the best of times. But a long rainless stretch has underscored the urgency of water problems in a region that grows three-fifths of China’s crops and houses more than two-fifths of its people — but gets only one-fifth as much rain as the rest of the country.

The current drought, considered the worst in Northern China in at least half a century, is crippling not only the country’s best wheat farmland, but also the wells that provide clean water to industry and to millions of people.

In the hamlet of Qiaobei in China’s wheat belt, a local farmer, Zheng Songxian, scrapes out a living growing winter wheat on a vest-pocket plot, a third of an acre carved out of a rocky hillside. He might have been expected to celebrate being offered the chance to till new land this winter. He did not.

Normally, the new land he was offered lies under more than 20 feet of water, part of the Luhun Reservoir in Henan Province. But this winter, Luhun has lost most of its water. And what was once lake bottom has become just another field of winter wheat, stunted for want of rain.

Mr. Zheng, 50, stood in his field on a recent winter day, in one hand a shrunken wheat plant freshly pulled from the earth. “I think I’m going to lose at least a third of my harvest this year,” he said. “If we don’t get rain before May, I won’t be able to harvest anything.”

Water supplies have been drying up in Northern China for decades, the result of pervasive overuse and waste. Aquifers have been so depleted that in some farming regions, wells probe a half-mile down before striking water.

Until light showers and snow arrived in recent days, much of the region had not seen rain since October. Although the showers reduced the hardest-hit drought area by half, more than 18,000 square miles of farmland remained critically endangered, the Chinese Agriculture Ministry said. About 4.7 million people and 2.5 million head of livestock were said to lack adequate drinking water.

For the Chinese government, already grappling with the fallout from a global economic crisis, this drought is inauspicious. Winter wheat is the nation’s second largest crop, behind rice, and a water shortage could raise irrigation costs and cut income for farmers, even as it increased wheat prices for farmers elsewhere in the world.

The drought is peaking as millions of migrant workers rendered jobless by factory closings and construction shutdowns are returning from urban areas to places where farming is the main source of income.

Government officials are clearly concerned by the prospect of rising unrest among jobless migrants, and water shortages and failed crops only heighten those worries.

Prime Minister Wen Jiabao visited a village in Henan this month, turning a hose on a parched field and telling farmers that help was on the way. The national government increased spending on drought relief by about $44 million and announced plans to speed up the provision of annual grain and farm subsidies worth another $13 billion.

The authorities have opened dam sluices, draining reservoirs like Luhan to irrigate dry fields; dispatched water trucks to thousands of villages with dry wells; and bored hundreds of new wells. Newspapers have breathlessly reported the launching of thousands of rocket shells filled with cigarette-size capsules of silver iodide, purportedly to seduce balky clouds into producing rain.

Drought-stricken Beijing, whose winter snows have all but vanished in the last 25 years, received perhaps three inches of flakes last week, the result, the government said, of its weather modification efforts.

Although Henan produces a quarter of China’s wheat, the area around Qiaobei is no breadbasket; it is hilly, rocky country where the farm families eat most of what they grow.

Mr. Zheng, who tills the dry reservoir bed, said his wheat was usually a foot tall by mid-February. But this year his field more resembled a suburban lawn in need of mowing, with clumps of wheat barely two inches high.

Irrigation for such a small plot, he said, is too costly. “We have a well up the hill,” he said, “but you have to pay 50 yuan every time you pump water, and you need to do it three times before you can harvest.” The total of 150 yuan would be more than $20. So Mr. Zheng is hoping for rain, and counting on his two sons and daughter, who have jobs in nearby towns, to make up the money lost from crop failure.

“This doesn’t really affect me,” he said. “Those poor families whose entire income comes from the land, they have a real problem.”

That is apparent in a neighboring village of 1,900, Zhailing, where wells already strained by falling groundwater levels have effectively run dry, and many farmers have written off their wheat.

“Even regular day water is not guaranteed. How can we talk about anything for our crops?” said Shi Shegan, the Communist Party secretary for the village.

The county-level chief of local drought-relief efforts, Gong Xinzhen, is determinedly upbeat about the situation. The county has bought 100 pumps to draw water from streams and wells, he said, and workers have handed out $15,000 worth of plastic bags for citizens to haul water from distant taps. Seven trucks are hauling water to communities like Zhailing where water has run out.

Mr. Shi applauds the government’s hard work. But he also notes that when his village was built 14 years ago, one could sink a new well and haul water up by the bucketful. Now, he said, wells sunk 100 feet deep get mere trickles and can be tapped only once or twice a day.

“All of these matters are just for the time being,” he said of the government’s relief efforts. “How can we solve this problem in the long run? Villagers are getting agitated over the water question.”

参考翻译

中国北方地区一直很干旱。然而长期无雨使得本地区的缺水问题越来越严峻。本地区种植着全国3／5的庄稼，养活多于全国人口的2／5 ，其降水量却只有全国其他地方的1／5.
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??近来的旱灾被认为是50年来北方地区最严重的。不仅严重危害着中国最好的小麦产区，同时也威胁着工业和百万人民纯净的井水供给。
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??郑松贤（音译）是位于中国小麦产区的桥北镇的以为当地农民。他在山坡上自己开垦了1／3亩的小地种植冬小麦，增加收入。他原应该庆祝今冬被提供机会耕种新土地，然而，他没有。
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??通常，作为河南省陆浑水库的一部分，他得到的那块新土地至少被20英尺的积水覆盖。但是今冬，陆浑失去了许多储蓄水。曾经是水库底部的地方现今成为了另一块冬麦田，因为缺水而龟裂。
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??最近的一个冬日，50岁的郑先生站在他的地里，一只手拿着刚从土地里拔出的枯萎的麦苗。“我想我将会至少损失今年收成的1/3，”他说。“假如五月前还不下雨，我将颗粒无收。”
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??普遍的过渡用水和浪费使得几十年来中国北部的水源日趋干枯。地下水逐渐耗尽，使得在一些种植区，井要打倒0.5英里深才能探测到水。
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??除了最近几天的小雨和雪，本地区的许多地方自十月来完全没有降水。中国农业部称，虽然阵雨减轻了一半地区的极度干旱，仍有超出18，000平方英里的农田旱情依然严重。大约470万人们和50万家畜缺少充分的饮用水。
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??对于正在埋头处理全球经济危机余波的中国政府来说，这次的旱灾是一场厄运。冬麦是仅次于大米的全国第二大谷物。缺水加大了灌溉的成本，减少了农民的收入，虽然这会提高全球其他地方的小麦价格。
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??成千上万的移民劳工因为工厂倒闭失业或建筑停工而从城市回到以种粮为主要经济收入的农村，这使得旱灾更加锐化。
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??政府官员非常担心失业移民将会使未来社会更加动荡，而缺水和坏收成使他们越来越担忧。
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??本月，温家宝总理在参观河南的一个小村庄时转动一块干涸土地的水龙头，告诉农民援助马上就到。国家将会在增加4400万元减轻干旱，并宣布计划另加130亿元用于每年粮食储备和种粮补贴。
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??一些当地部门已经打开水坝水闸和累死陆浑的水库来灌溉干旱土地，对上千个枯井乡村，派遣载水卡车，并探测开挖数百口新井。为增加降水，新近已发射的数千枚携带碘化银的火箭，对此报纸都在抢着报道。
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??政府宣称，遭受干旱的北京（以往25年都有降雪，今冬却没有）由于人工对大气的影响，上周获得了大约3英寸的降雪。
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??尽管河南小麦产量占全国1/4 ，桥北地区却不是小麦产区。桥北是个多岩石的丘陵地区，这里农民大多自给自足。
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??耕种干枯水库河床的郑先生说，以往在二月中旬，他的麦子一般有一英尺高了。但是今年他的土地麦子几乎没有两英寸高，更像郊区需要割的草坪。
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??他说灌溉这小块地的代价太高。“我们在山上有一口井，”他说，“但是每抽一次水，你必须付50元，而且在收获前你必须灌溉三次。”总共需要的150元远多于20美元。所以郑先生期盼着下雨，同时也指望他在邻镇工作的两个儿子和一个女儿可以给钱弥补种粮损失。
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??“这并没有真正影响我，”他说，“但是那些种粮是唯一收入的穷人，他们真的很难。”
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??在有1900居民的邻村翟岭，由于地下水缺失，井逐渐干枯，这种情况更加明显，许多农民放弃了他们的小麦。
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??村子的共产党书记石社干（音译）说：“我们日常的饮水都不能保证，又何谈灌溉谷物呢？”
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??本地旱情救援组的县级领导龚新征并没有被目前的形势击败。他说县里买了100台抽水机从河里和井里抽水，同时工人已做出总价值15，000美元的塑料袋以备市民从从远处拉水。7辆拖拉机在向像翟岭这样无水的地区运水。
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??石先生赞许政府的艰苦工作。他也指出他的村子在14年前刚建时，可以打新井，从其中抽出大约一桶水。但是现在，他说井打倒100英尺深只能得到细流，一天只能提水一到两次。
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??“这些救援措施只是暂时的，”他评价政府的救援行动。“我们如何才能长远的解决这个问题？许多村民对吃水问题越来越不安。”