Chinafotopress

Over 45% of drinking water in rural areas of China is not fit for drinking according to a World Wildlife Fund report; 300 million rural-dwellers don’t have guaranteed access to drinking water. And in 630 cities there’s the daily threat of water-borne diseases like E.coli because local municipalities don’t have the means to treat the sewage flowing from China’s ever-expanding cities.

These statistics, culled by CIB from a stack of national and international reports, suggest a nightmarish scenario for China’s water supplies. And yet it’s a ......dated in one Ministry. Currently a bewildering maze of ministries, the Ministry of Water Resources, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Communications, Ministry of Public Health and half-a-dozen state bodies, all have a stake in managing the country’s water. In blocking pollution of the Yangtze River, WWF and its local partners have had to turn to different ministries, depending on whether waste is discharged above or below the river bank. “We need one body to make decisions more quickly.”