Villagers of Beiwangzhuang, a small village of Qingxian County of north China's Hebei Province, have had sweet drinking water for generations.

But now, they had to fetch salty water from a well for irrigation two kilometers from their village.

"When the only water well in our village collapsed one day two years ago, we had to fetch water from an irrigation well far away from the village," said Deng Guisheng, a villager in his 50s.

According to a quarantine report, water taken from the irrigation well is not drinkable as the content of fluorin in water is much higher than the state required standard.

Local hospital sources said that a dozen of senior villagers who were diagnosed of fractures were hospitalized over the past two years. Experts ascribed this for drinking too much water with high content of fluorine.

According to local geological department, 14.6 million people in Hebei Province drink unqualified water due to deterioration of ground water.

Water resources experts attributed the situation to excessive use of underground water in Haihe River valley.

The Haihe River valley, with an area of 320,000 square kilometers, covers six provinces and two municipalities, including Beijing, Tianjin and part of Hebei and Shandong Provinces.

"Due to fast economic growth and social development, the region faces severe water shortage," said He Shan, deputy chief engineer of the Haihe River Water Resources Commission of China.

He said, "Ninety-eight percent of the water resources in the river valley have been exploited, far exceeding the world standard of 40 percent."

Things are getting worse as an enlarging funnel-shaped zone, covering over 40,000 square kilometers, has taken shape in the Haihe River valley, a result of excessive tapping of ground water.

Ground sinkage resulting from the funnel-shaped areas keeps happening in the region.

Wei said the urban district of Dezhou has sunk by about 0.38 meters since the 1990s and it keeps sinking.
 
Situation in Cangzhou and Tianjin are more worrisome. Experts estimate that the ground level of the two cities would drop 3,645 mm by 2010 if no efficient actions were taken to save underground water resources.

Ground sinkage would also lead to cracks in pipelines and buildings, and erosion of seawater in coastal areas, said He Shan, the engineer with the Haihe Water Resources Commission of the Ministry of Water Resources.

To prevent the situation from turning more worse, localities in the area have taken a series of measures to save water resources.

Currently, 54.7 percent of arable land of Hebei Province, totaling more than 2.4 million hectares, are irrigated with water-saving methods, saving 2.5 billion cubic meters of water annually.

Tianjin, the largest port city in north China, cut its acreage of paddy fields by half, from former more than 13,000 hectares to the current about 6,000 hectares, to save water.

Shandong Province has raised charges on water consumption, with the price of ground water being higher than the surface water.

By doing so, damages to environment can be avoided while achieving economic development and social progress.

(Xinhua News Agency July 27, 2005)