Beijing Newspeak

Over the weekend, a Beijing-based freelancer kindly bestowed upon me the secrets of how to succeed in the fickle, coldly commercial world that is journalistic self-employment. When in China, write about pandas, dragons and kung fu monks. I assumed it was an embittered joke but he did repeat it four times. Inspirational stuff, but while I still cling on to a scrap of idealism, I’m toying with the idea of taking a trip down to Poyang Lake in Jiangxi next month. China’s largest freshwater lake is fast approaching pond status thanks to a prolonged drought, with its surface area now down to 50 square kilometres from 3,000 square kilometres during the summer flood season. Its title should really be accompanied by a caveat: China’s largest freshwater lake - in July. The international media - specialist water publications aside - has mostly ignored Xinhua’s rumblings on the subject which might suggest I’m going to end up with unsellable copy. Should be interesting anyway.

One of the most frustrating aspects of being positioned in the polisher ranks - and therefore at the end of the editorial chain (barring the censors of politically sensitive content) - is the distance we are from the source of a story like the Poyang Lake yarn. It normally starts with a statistic provided by a provincial government department to an unquestioning local reporter (in a completely different department to mine and therefore not technically obliged to cooperate) that makes your eyes want to wrench themselves free of their sockets. In this case, it was the fact China’s largest lake is now 1.67 percent of its normal size during the summer - 50 square kilometres down from 3,000. For some much-needed perspective on this figure, it is essential to know that the surface area of Poyang Lake fluctuates spectacularly from summer to winter as discussed in this Science Daily article from 2005. However, the Science Daily report talks of a winter surface area of 1,000 square kilometres and Tan Guoliang, director of the Jiangxi hydrological bureau, told Xinhua that the area of the lake last winter was 300 to 500 square kilometres. In other words, it was up to ten times larger than the current figure.

Questions flood the mind. What does the dried-up lake actually look like? How is this affecting people around the lake? What are the long-term effects? What about the species that live in the lake? Instead of answers you reach the infamous seven-letter word that rounds off every Xinhua story. Enditem. A quick recap and the reaction to the statistic was encapsulated in a single paragraph all along:

The lake’s low water level has caused drinking water shortages for residents near the lake and affected industrial production. Local authorities are “taking all kinds of measures” to deal with the situation.

Several days of persistence later and the final product is acceptable. We have the long-term effects:

NANCHANG, Dec. 14 (Xinhua) — More than 100,000 residents are suffering drinking water shortages around the Poyang Lake, China’s largest freshwater lake, as drought strikes - and an expert has warned that the condition may blight the area for a further 10 winters, a direct result of climate change.

How local residents have been affected:

“My house used to be by the side of the lake. Now I have to go over a dozen kilometers away to get to the lake water. We have been used to the seasonal variations of the lake, but we have never been badly short of drinking water supply before,” said Yu Wenchang, a villager living in the northeastern part of the lake.

Some 1,000 villagers in Yu’s village of Xiayangzui in Changdu County of Jiangxi now live on water from four wells.

“A total of 52 of the 56 wells in the village have dried up, as the lake water retreats. Only four have water. Senior citizens told us that they had never seen the lake reduced so drastically in winter,” Yu said.

Villagers have channeled water from a nearby pond to the dry wells, and they are preparing to dig deeper for water.

Many villagers have abandoned the use of boats since they can walk across the marsh of the exposed lake bed.

The gloomy prediction:

Jiang Tong, an expert with the Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences said that the Poyang Lake’s winter drought is likely to continue for the next 10years.

“Both the stream flows into the river and the Yangtze River water to replenish the lake will be insufficient in dry seasons in the future, because of climate change and the exploitation of water resources,” said Jiang, who is a specialist in seasonal water responses to climate and land changes in Poyang Lake Basin.

But satisfaction remains elusive, probably as a result of witnessing the depressing absence of urgency in the reporting of the story and the lack of interest from the world media. Of course, startling embodiments of climate change are cropping up all over the world. I just happen to think the Poyang Lake case is particularly noteworthy. Xinhua reported at the beginning of the month that the water level of the lake is near its lowest in history. By the end of the dry season, it will surely set a new record. So what happens to the lake in ten years’ time when the Yangtze, its main benefactor, continues to be affected by drought and certain large-scale dam projects? Has the local government issued regulations on the industrial use of water from Poyang? China Dialogue has reported on the plight of the lake’s finless porpoises, which look like going the way of the Yangtze River dolphins (the 99.999-percent extinct baiji). Will their future be further endangered by the lake shrinkage? And what about the 50 million carp fry that were poured into the lake this summer to replenish fish stocks? It’s a bit like giving someone a free house with retractable walls that close in each day until there is less space than in a cell used for solitary confinement.

The news trickling out of Jiangxi coincides with reports that one million people are suffering the effects of drought in Guangxi as a result of the region’s worst drought since 1951. And then there was this devastating report (via the Globe and Mail) from Reuters at the end of last week which began:

BEIJING — China will have exploited all available water supplies to the limit by 2030, the government has warned, ordering officials to prepare for worse to come as global warming and economic expansion drain lakes and rivers.

As well, a state newspaper warned on Friday that drought next year could hit crops and stoke already heady inflation.

China’s surface and underground water supplies are under strain from feverish economic growth and a population passing 1.3 billion. And scarcity will worsen with global warming, the central government warned in a directive.

“In recent years economic and social development has led to increasing water demand, and with the impact of global warming, drought and water scarcity are increasingly grave”, said a directive issued by the office of the State Council, or cabinet, late on Thursday.

“Taking into full account water-saving, by 2030 our country’s water use will reach or approach the total volume of exploitable water resources, and the drought-fighting situation will be increasingly serious.”

The document on the government Web site (www.gov.cn) urges officials to make emergency plans for coping with drought and promises more spending on water-saving technology and artificial rain-making. Local governments must also develop policies to aid and compensate drought-hit farmers.

We can only make guesses about the appearance of Poyang Lake in 2030. Perhaps, as climatic extremes continue, China will end up with a lake fit to burst following severe summer flooding and a mere puddle during the winter months.