China's drought-hit areas shrink after rain, snow

Xinhua: The size of drought-stricken areas in China is significantly smaller after rain and snow since Friday, the country's drought relief authority said Monday. As of Sunday, the total acreage of drought-hit farmlands in eight wheat-producing provinces was 37.82 million mu (2.52 million hectares), down 73.69 mu from 20 days ago when the drought was at its worst, said the Office of State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters (SFDH) in a statement on its website.

The statement said most of these areas had seen rain or snow since Feb. 25. The eight provinces include Shanxi, Shaanxi, Jiangsu, Gansu, Anhui, while the other three provinces of Shandong, Hebei and Henan are the worst affected with total drought-hit crop areas exceeding 24 millon mu.

The statement said that since the start of this month, local governments had focused efforts on irrigating 117.5 million mu of crops, more than 40 percent of the total in the eight provinces. Since the autumn, local governments in these regions had mobilized more than 14 million people to help irrigate 190 million mu of farmland….

Winter view of the Great Wall of China from space, via NASA