China's second mass relocation in the Three Gorges reservoir area began early last month. The first one was initiated over ten years ago to make way for the giant Three Gorges Dam Project, begun in 1993 and designed to generate electricity and contain floods on the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. The government relocated a total of 1.13 million people. This time the number of relocated people would more than double that figure to 2.3 million. The relocation would help bring down the residential population in northeast Chongqing to 7 million.

 

Another Mass Relocation Planned in Three Gorges Area

 

On August 21, the Chongqing municipal government reviewed a draft guideline concerning the social and economic development of northeast Chongqing area. The final document will be published soon after government approval, an official with the Chongqing Development and Reform Commission said in early September.

 

An important part of the guideline outlines the mass relocation of people from the northeast area into the Chongqing city proper or its Wanzhou District.

 

The northeast region covers 11 districts and counties in the Three Gorges Reservoir area.

 

 

This is the second mass relocation in the reservoir area. The first one was initiated over ten years ago to make way for the giant Three Gorges Dam Project, begun in 1993 and designed to generate electricity and contain floods on the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. The government relocated a total of 1.13 million people. More...

 

Last 100,000 People to Be Relocated from Gigantic Reservoir

China will move the last group of more than 100,000 residents away from the Three Gorges reservoir area by the end of next year as the final part of a massive relocation plan launched in 1993 to resettle 1.35 million people.

About 100,000 residents and five businesses will move from Kaixian County in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality to make way for the gigantic Three Gorges reservoir, whose water level will eventually reach 175 meters when the world's largest water conservation project is completed in 2008, said Wang Xian'gang, director of the Chongqing Municipal Relocation and Resettlement Bureau.

In central-southern Hubei Province, about 8,000 people will also be moved out of the reservoir area, local authorities said. More...

Premier Calls for Better Resettlement of Migrants

 

Premier Wen Jiabao has called on the governments and departments around the country to help the people and local governments around the Three Gorges reservoir.

Speaking at a national conference on the country's coordinated support of the Three Gorges area held here on Monday, Wen said other provinces and regions should do more to help resettle people who were displaced by the reservoir.

More than a million people, who mainly lived in 20 counties of southwest China's Chongqing Municipality and central China's Hubei Province, were moved to make way for the Three Gorges Dam Project which submerged their lands.

The conference was urged to provide stronger support to the reservoir area so it can develop its own agriculture, tourism and processing industries and create more jobs for those who had to move. More...

Shifting Land Leads to Evacuation

Twenty-two families living on a hillside about 17 km upstream from the Three Gorges dam are to be relocated after local government officials recorded abnormal ground movements in the area.

The relocation will affect all 99 residents of Miaohe, a village in the Maoping Township, in Zigui County, central China's Hubei Province, which sits on the northern bank of the Yangtze, China's longest river.

Zhao Zongzheng, chief of the agricultural office of Zigui county government, said that by late October, all the villagers will have been moved into new government-financed homes some 2 km away. More...

China to Aid Residents of Three Gorges Region

The Chinese government will invest 55 billion yuan (US$6.88 billion) to settle residents relocated by the Three Gorges Project and support local industries to provide enough job opportunities in the next five years.

The fund will also be used for infrastructure construction, environmental protection, and social development undertakings in the region, said a senior official of southwest China's Chongqing Municipality.

Investigations have revealed the unemployment rate in areas around the Three Gorges Reservoir was as high as 11.5 percent last year, despite a drop of 1.3 percentage points from 2005, said Wang Hongju, mayor of Chongqing,

Over a million residents have bid farewell to their hometowns and resettled because of the construction of the three gorges project. More...

Construction of Major Section of Water Project to Kick off

Construction of the Henan Province section of the central route of China's South-to-North Water Diversion project will kick off by the end of this month.

Construction began on the central route of the 1,277-km-long project in 2003. It aims to divert water from Danjiangkou Reservoir in central China's Hubei Province to northern China, including Beijing and Tianjin Municipality.

Sources with the Henan provincial government said the 731-km Henan section of the canal, the longest part, is expected to cost 67 billion yuan (US$8.4 billion).

Forty-three cities and townships in the province will benefit from the province's annual water quota of 3.77 billion cubic meters drawn from the 9.5 billion cubic meters diverted through the canal every year, when the first phase of the project is completed in 2008. More...

(China.org.cn September 28, 2007)