82% of people in China drink shallow wells and river water, of which 75% suffer from severe water pollution and bacteria exceeding hygiene standards. The population of drinking water contaminated with organic matter is about 160 million. For a long time, people have believed that tap water is safe and hygienic. However, due to water pollution, tap water nowadays can no longer be considered hygienic.
According to the latest data, only 23% of residents in major cities in China meet hygiene standards for drinking water, while the qualified rate of drinking water in small towns and rural areas is even lower.
The top priority for water pollution prevention and control is to ensure that drinking water is qualified. Therefore, efforts should be made to increase water pollution monitoring and establish water source protection zones. The mother river of the Yellow River was cut off for the first time in 1972 and lasted for 226 days in 1997, with nearly 700 kilometers of riverbed drying up. The Haihe River has 300 tributaries, no river is dry, no river is foul smelling. The groundwater in North China is severely overexploited, forming the world's largest groundwater funnel area with an area of over 70000 square kilometers, causing ground subsidence and seawater intrusion. Out of 668 cities in the country, over 400 have insufficient water supply and over 100 suffer from severe water shortages. Since the late 1990s, the rate of land desertification has increased to over 3400 square kilometers per year. Even more terrifying is that China's total water resources are still declining. In 1997, the total volume was 2785.5 billion cubic meters, but in 2004 it dropped to 2413 billion cubic meters. Since the 1950s, more than 20 rivers in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River have shrunk by an average of 37.1%. The World Wildlife Fund released a report on March 19th, listing the Yangtze River, which is the third longest and largest in the world, as one of the 10 major rivers facing drying up.
