The Great Chinese Water Crisis

An animal skull lies on the ground at an abandon farm, near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. "Some regions are already near the critical temperature threshold," the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in a draft summary report obtained by Reuters. "In parts of Asia, increases in flood and drought will exacerbate rural poverty, due to negative impacts on rice crops and increases in food prices and costs of living."

A man works in a field near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. Rising temperatures are likely to speed icecap melting in the Himalayas, which could bring first floods and then severe drought, with diminished seasonal melts unable to replenish China's rivers, including the mighty Yangtze.

Farmers remove a dead tree from a field near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. This year, China published a national "water census" showing that as many as 28,000 rivers logged in a government database had vanished since the 1990s, leaving just under 23,000.

An irrigation canal is seen near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. The census gave no reason for the disappearance, but China's weather bureau said several major rivers, including the Yellow River, a massive northern waterway linking nine provinces, had been dwindling since 1970 and the trend was likely to continue.

Visitors look at the Hongyashan water reservoir on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. "We have witnessed major fluctuations in precipitation in different parts of China," said Ma Jun, a water expert and director of the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE), which monitors China's rivers.

Remains of an abandon farm stand near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. "One thing in the mind of policymakers and researchers is that climate change will add to uncertainties -- in some areas, the water supply situation is already quite tense." But rising temperatures are only part of China's problems, many of which have resulted from overpopulation, aggressive industrialisation and a huge reliance on elaborate engineering schemes to irrigate crops and harness scarce supplies.

Old luggage lies on the ground at an abandon farm, near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. "China's water shortages stem more from problematic urbanisation and water resource management, rather than the scapegoat of climate change," said Zhou Lei, a fellow at Nanjing University who studies how industry affects the environment.

A plant root lies on the bed of the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. China has vowed to spend trillions of yuan to boost supplies, clean rivers and protect water tables. But even if supplies remain steady, water resources per person, now at 2,100 cubic metres or 28 percent of the global average, are expected to decline further as the population grows.

A glove lies on the ground at an abandon farm, near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. Hundreds of rivers have already vanished in northwestern Gansu, one of the country's driest regions. Beijing still needs to feed its growing food, energy and industrial demand.

A dry plant stump is seen an abandon farm, near the dried up Shiyang river on the outskirts of Minqin town, Gansu province. China has long sought to wring as much water as it can from its parched earth, but is approaching the limits of what it can retrieve. Projections expect total annual demand to reach 700 billion to 800 billion cubic metres by 2030, only slightly lower than total available supplies.

A dry slope is seen near the Shiyang river on the outskirts of Wuwei, Gansu province. The reliance on megaprojects to solve shortages has created a vicious circle, channelling water to state-owned farms, giant industrial plants or hydropower stations, diverting natural flows and leaving surrounding areas more parched than before.

The sun sets on an area of desert on the outskirts of Minqin town, in Gansu province. Some regions desperate for growth have been forced to choose between water and energy. Gansu plans to build several giant hydro plants in the upper reaches of the Yellow River, defying warnings that this could restrict downstream water supplies. Elsewhere, green groups say scarce water resources are being diverted from agriculture to profitable coal-fired power plants, with China building thirsty "coal production bases" in dry areas such as Inner Mongolia, Ningxia and Shaanxi.

Wind turbines used to generate electricity are seen at a wind farm in Guazhou, 590 miles northwest of Lanzhou, Gansu Province. "They experiment with technologies to treat the problem, like the water transfer projects being done right now, but they are draining resources in a very wrong way." China has put its faith in elaborate engineering and technological solutions such as giant dams and diversion channels, besides cloud seeding and desalination.

A man stands at the window of a building near a wind turbine used to generate electricity, at a wind farm in Guazhou, 590 miles northwest of Lanzhou, Gansu Province.