People’s Republic of China: Confronting Catastrophic Drought and Pollution

China is the most populous country in the world and is burdened by substantial poverty and income inequity. There are 100 million economic migrants in China. The country is vulnerable to both drought in the north and flooding in the south. Moreover, China, which has 20 percent of the global population, has only 7 percent of global water resources. Survey data from the WHO (World Health Organization) and UNICEF Joint Monitoring Program for Water and Sanitation note that over 90 million Chinese do not have access to an improved water source and 450 million citizens do not have access to improved sanitation. These are major development problems which severely impact health, development, and water quality. Increasing water shortages in the north, where approximately 64 percent of the population live, pose significant human rights, environmental, and economic crises for China. Between 1978 and 2010, 600 million Chinese were lifted out of poverty.1 Although China has achieved rapid advances in elevating citizens out of extreme poverty and the many forms of deprivation that go along with it, the sheer size of the Chinese population that continues to live in socioeconomic distress impedes overall progress on a range of important issues including water security and health. Approximately 55 percent of the population is rural.