Water Conservation and Efficiency

Agricultural water

65% of China’s water is used in agriculture and this means that shortages in vital grain producing areas threaten the food security of the nation (BBC news, 2014). To address this issue there has been a great deal of investment into new technologies to enhance the efficiency of irrigation techniques. There were also a number of reforms in water management and prices with an entirely new fee collection system having been implemented (Lohmar, et al, 2003). While there may have been significant progress made in China’s quest for water security, compared to other nations China’s agricultural water use efficiency is still considerably low.

Industrial water

Over the last thirty years China has experienced extremely high rates of economic and industrial growth, this growth has led to a significantly larger portion of China’s water being allocated to the industrial sector: increasing from 10% to 23.2% between 1980 and 2006 (Wang, et al, 2009). China’s response has been to push forward the implementation of new technologies to increase industrial water, recycling, conversion and reuse. However China’s efforts thus far seem ineffective as reports suggest that industrial water use remains highly inefficient (Wang, et al, 2009). 

Household water

Supplying adequate water in terms of quantity and quality for households is where China faces its toughest challenge. Of China’s 660 cities almost 67% of them face water shortages and 108 cities are classified as being in severe water distress (Cheng et al, 2009). The key to satisfying China’s household water demands lies in water conservation. The Chinese government has undergone a process of strengthening its regulations on water use. They have implemented a quota system in certain cities to reduce water stresses as well as reforming water pricing in an attempt to encourage more sustainable water use in households (Cheng et al, 2009).

Improving the situation

Enhancing water use efficiency has been the government’s primary way of addressing the countries water scarcity in the previous decade. A comprehensive policy program was set forth in 2005 in order to guide and protect the development and application of new conservation technologies as well as to improve the management of water resources in both administrative and legislative spheres (Cho, 2011). This seems to have had a significant effect as we can see from figure 1 that the water use in 2005 per 10,000 Yuan GDP was approximately 305m³. This figure is three times higher than the world average and six times higher than the U.S. (Gleick, 2013). The water use per 10,000 Yuan GDP has now fallen significantly over the period in which the governments new water conservation policies have been in place. The new figure of just 122m³ represents a vastly improved level of water efficiency and conservation, however it is still quite high in comparison to many other developed countries and is way above the Chinese target who believed they could be lower than 115m³ by the end of 2010 (Gleick, 2013). The new water-pricing scheme has been very successful as prices rise and fall depending on supply and cost of delivery. This has helped limit the extent of shortages in times of drought but has also raised issues of water inequalities as the rich can afford as much as possible with the poor suffering when resources are low. All major urban areas have now also been fitted with new water saving devices that have contributed significantly to China’s improved efficiency.

Figure 1: Water use per GDP in China from 2003 to 2013 (in cubic meters per 10,000 yuan) 

Source: Statista.com 

These improvements in water conservation, reuse and recycling represent the Chinese governments early attempts at addressing the issue of water scarcity, an issue that they had ignored for some time. These efforts still remain at the heart of Chinese water resource policies but more recently in an attempt to address the bad publicity from international media the government has begun to focus more time and resources on large-scale hard engineering technics. I will begin to discuss these large-scale projects next week, as they are vital to understanding China’s current and future approaches to water security.

China Uncensored

I wanted to start this week’s blog with a video that sums up nicely the issues that I outlined last week in regards to Chinas shortage of clean fresh water. The video also moves on to comment, quite critically, on Chinas recent efforts to address the water scarcity issue.

While I think it would be wise to consider the potential biases of an American based YouTube channel who’s angle is to be particularly scathing and critical of the CPC, the video does raise some interesting points. In future posts I will be discussing the three gorges dam as well as this proposed North-South diversion project and I will try to give a more balanced assessment.

The Problem: an Introduction

Hello and welcome to my blog!

Have you ever wondered how a country with over 1.3 billion inhabitants manages to meet water demands of its people?....

Me too! This will be the topic of my blog; over the next few months I will be investigating some of the ways that the Chinese government and other NGO’s are addressing the water shortage. I will be assessing the use of new geoengineering techniques as well as new political policies and practices and what this means for the future of Chinas water security and consequently food security. This assessment will take place through the mediums of books, videos, newspaper articles and academic readings that I find relevant and most importantly interesting. I hope you find this blog to be engaging and informative and I look to reading your comments over the coming months.

Other than just introducing my blog and its aims I wanted to use this first post to outline some of the biggest issues that China faces in its struggle for water security. Quite clearly Chinas mammoth population of over 1.3 billion is a cause for concern. Figure 1 shows the relationship between population and water withdrawals, we can see how the use of water has increased with population and when population peaks as expected in 2030 then the annual per capita renewable freshwater availability will fall to 1760m³, this is just 4% higher than the water stress limit suggested by Falkenmark and Widstrand (1992). The stresses on freshwater supply will be further exacerbated by the rapid economic growth, improved standard of living and increased urbanisation that China is experiencing. 

Figure 1: Chinas water (a) total supply by source from 1997 to 2006; (b) trends in total withdrawal by use categories and population starting in 1980 and projected up to 2030

Source: (Cheng et al, 2009)

China also suffers from a common issue of having its water resources located in the “wrong” place and “wrong” time (Cheng et al,2009). There is a spatial and temporal mismatch in the way its water resources are diffused throughout the country. The Northern Chinese provinces as defined by the boundaries of the Yellow, Huai and Hai rivers, contribute significantly to industrial output and GDP and they are home to a third of China’s population, yet only have access to 7.7% of China’s total water resources (Cheng et al, 2009). The Southwest on the other hand receives 21.3% of China’s water while contributing only 0.7% toward GDP, this is in part due to the fact that the northwest receives <50mm of rainfall a year, a considerably small figure especially when compared to the costal regions of the southeast that receive >1600mm a year (Cheng et al, 2009). The Monsoon climate does not help as having the majority of your fresh rainwater fall in the summer makes collecting and utilising it extremely challenging, it also makes China prone to flooding and results in periods of drought.

China’s rapid economic growth and the resulting waste and pollution this generates has only served to compound issues of water scarcity. A great deal of Chinas ground and surface-waters have been polluted as industrial waste and agricultural byproducts as well as municipal waste find there way into rivers and lakes. The statistics are particularly damning as it is estimated that 40% of China’s surface water is fit only for industrial and agricultural use and only half of the country’s major cities meet the standard for drinking water (Gleick, 2013).

These are just some of the challenges China faces in its battle for water security and over the coming months I will begin to assess they’re responses on all political, practical and technological fronts.