Jul 31, 2014

Growing cities, overuse of fertilizers and factory wastewater have degraded China’s water supplies to the extent that half the nation’s rivers and lakes are severely polluted. China aims to spend $850 billion to improve filthy water supplies over the next decade, but even such huge outlays may do little to reverse damage caused by decades of pollution and overuse in Beijing’s push for rapid economic growth.

: A man uses electric rods to catch fish at a river junction point in Xi’an, Shaanxi province, May 21, 2013. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: People walk through algae-covered seaside in Qingdao, Shandong province, July 1, 2013. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: A man walks by a pipe discharging waste water into the Yangtze River from a paper mill in Anqing, Anhui province, December 4, 2013. (REUTERS/William Hong)

: A child drinks water near a stream in Fuyuan county, Yunnan province on March 20, 2009. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Dead fish are seen at a pond on the outskirts of Wuhan, Hubei province on April 21, 2009. The cause of death was attributed to a discharge of sanitary sewage, local media reported. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Workers clean up floating garbage on the Yangtze Rive near the Three Gorges reservoir in Fengjie County of China’s Chongqing municipality, on November 1, 2009. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: Gnats, or small biting flies, gather on railings along the East Lake in Wuhan, Hubei province on November 26, 2009. Gnats appear in the lake due to water pollution and they will leave once the temperature in the area drops in about half a month’s time, according to experts, local media reported. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Fishermen walk through the muddy bottom of a polluted canal collecting fish in central Beijing on October 21, 2010. (REUTERS/David Gray)

: A man sits atop a drain as he fishes at a polluted canal in central Beijing on October 26, 2010. (REUTERS/David Gray)

: Pipes coming from a rare earth smelting plant spew polluted water into a vast tailings dam near Xinguang Village, located on the outskirts of the city of Baotou in China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in this October 31, 2010 picture. (REUTERS/David Gray)

: A fish whose tail is stuck in a partially frozen fish farm is seen near an abandoned steel mill of Qingquan Steel Group in Qianying township, Hebei province February 18, 2014. There are dozens of “zombie” mills that can no longer afford to operate in and around Tangshan, an industrial city of 7 million people in China’s northern Hebei province. (REUTERS/Petar Kujundzic)

: Polluted water in Songhua River reaches Harbin, the capital of northeastern Heilongjiang province on November 24, 2005. (REUTERS/China Newsphoto)

: A child swims in a polluted reservoir in Pingba, southwest China’s Guizhou province on September 2, 2006. More than a third of China’s national nature reserves are sacrificing the environment for profit, a state environmental official said on Friday, Xinhua News Agency reported. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: A fisherman jumps from his boat to the bank after fishing in the morning at a polluted river in Hefei, in east China’s Anhui province March 8, 2007. (REUTERS/Jianan Yu)

: A worker cleans away dead fish at a lake in Wuhan, central China’s Hubei province July 11, 2007. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: A man swims in a polluted canal in the centre of Beijing on August 16, 2007. (REUTERS/David Gray)

: Dead fish are seen floating on a polluted river in Hefei, Anhui province March 19, 2010. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A resident washes clothes in a polluted pond in Xiangfan, Hubei province, March 21, 2010. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Laborers work to drain sewage water from a leaked sewage tank at a copper mine in Shanghang, Fujian province, July 13, 2010. The sewage leak from the copper mine owned by Zijin Mining Group Co, whose shares were suspended from trading in Hong Kong on Monday, has polluted a river and reservoir in Fujian province, Xinhua news agency reported. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A laborer cleans up oil at the oil spill site near Dalian port, Liaoning province July 23, 2010. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A fisherman fills his cupped palms with water from the algae-filled Chaohu Lake in Hefei, Anhui province, June 16, 2009. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A woman walks on a bridge over a polluted river at a suburban area of Wenzhou, in Zhejiang province February 18, 2011. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

: A boy swims in the algae-filled coastline of Qingdao, Shandong province July 15, 2011. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: A journalist takes a sample of the red polluted water in the Jianhe River in Luoyang, Henan province December 13, 2011. According to local media, the sources of the pollution are two illegal chemical plants discharging their production waste water into the rain sewer pipes. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: A worker looks at a photographer from a door of a factory manufacturing screws and nuts next to a polluted river in Jiaxing, Zhejiang province March 15, 2012. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A child is reflected in a drainage ditch as he jumps over trash at a village which will soon be demolished, on the outskirts of Jiaxing city, Zhejiang province, January 12, 2013. (REUTERS/William Hong)

: An elderly man exercises in the morning as he faces chimneys emitting smoke behind buildings across the Songhua river in Jilin, Jilin province, February 24, 2013. China’s new rulers will focus on consumer-led growth to narrow the gap between rich and poor while taking steps to curb pollution and graft, the government said on Tuesday, tackling the main triggers for social unrest in the giant nation. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Dead pigs float in a branch of Huangpu River in Pinghu, Zhejiang province, March 11, 2013. Over 2,200 pigs have been found dead in one of Shanghai’s main water sources, official media reported on Monday, triggering a public outcry in China where concerns over food safety and environmental pollution run high. (REUTER/Aly Song)

: A tourist boat, decorated with green lights, travels on the Pearl River amid heavy haze in Guangzhou, Guangdong province March 3, 2014. China’s environment ministry has vowed to ‘harshly punish’ factories and power plants that contributed to a hazardous smog which enveloped much of Northern China, official state media reported. (REUTERS/Alex Lee)

: A man stands beside the algae-covered coastline of Qingdao, Shandong province, June 26, 2014. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Fishermen clean up oil at an oil spill site near Dalian Port, Liaoning province July 27, 2010. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: Fishermen row a boat in the algae-filled Chaohu Lake in Hefei, Anhui province, on June 19, 2009. The country has invested 51 billion yuan ($7.4 billion) towards the construction of 2,712 projects for the treatment of eight rivers and lakes including Huaihe River, Haihe River, Liaohe River, Chaohu Lake, Dianchi Lake, Songhua River, the Three Gorges region of the Yangtze River and its upstream area, Xinhua News Agency reported. (REUTERS/Jianan Yu)

: A man cups algae-filled water in his hands at the Donghu Lake in Wuhan, Hubei province, August 17, 2009. (REUTERS/China Daily)

: A dead fish floats in water filled with blue-green algae at the East Lake in Wuhan, Hubei province on August 20, 2012. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A man looks at a contaminated river in Cangnan county of Wenzhou, Zhejiang province on July 24, 2014. Local authorities said the water in the river turned red after several buckets of red dye were misplaced near the riverbank and the local environmental protection administration did not find harmful substances in the water, local media reported. (REUTERS/Stringer)

: A volunteer holds sand mixed with plastic pellets during a clean-up of a beach during Hong Kong’s Discovery Day on August 4, 2012.The Government says it has so far collected more than 58,000 kilograms (177,868 pounds) of plastic pellets after several containers were blown off a ship when Typhoon Vicente hit Hong Kong at the end of last month. (REUTERS/Tyrone Siu)