Summary:
Chinese officials announced on January 25 that the government will begin to promote water conservancy, promote the sustainability of water, and reduce the average amount of water used annually on the national level. Floods, officials have pointed out, have recently shown the weaknesses of the water conservancy policies and related infrastructure in China. By 2020, new flood control and drought relief measures will be put in place to allow for better use of water. A strong drive to maintain amounts of water consumption and irrigation measures will be put in place, which should be advantageous for farmers and consumers alike. China proposes that it will double average annual spending on water conservancy over the next ten years, as spending in 2010 totaled around $15 billion. Following the typical Communistic theme, these new policies and "reforms" will be noted in the next Five Year Plan. Government loans will be issued for corporations interested in investing in the water sector.
Significance:
The notion that China, arguably the second most powerful nation in the world, does not have passable water conservancy or irrigation systems in place is quite interesting, if not odd. The idea of Communism manifests itself in this issue because there has been no reason for the government to intervene in this lack of water conservancy thus far. Without a strong private sector of the economy, there has been no need, driven by competition, for the government to implement any of these policies until the country was directly affected by environmental issues. Another idea that shows up in this article is infrastructure. It is apparent that China has not taken the opportunity or initiative to boost its infrastructure in this regard. There has been heavy government oversight in this entire project, which ties in with the ideas of Communism and unitary states.
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