China has allocated 199 million yuan (32.1 million U.S. dollars) from the central budget to create artificial rain in an effort to ease drought, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday.

The money has been channeled to central and southwestern provinces, where a record-setting heat wave has spread since July and caused water shortages, power supply issues and problems with growing crops.

Temperatures have hit 42 degrees Celsius in some parts of the country.

Guizhou Province, Chongqing Municipality and regions south of the Yangtze River have seen their precipitation levels drop to less than 20 percent of that in previous years, the ministry said.

The country's National Meteorological Center forecast on Thursday that high temperatures will continue in most southern provinces in the next three days. Endi

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