China Development Brief
May 18, 2002

China has been experiencing increasingly long flood seasons over the past few years, according to a recent Operations Update by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

Over the past few years China has been experiencing increasingly long flood seasons, extending into the Autumn months, according to a recent Operations Update by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. The flood seasons generally concludes in August but this year, says the Red Cross, "Following heavy floods that commenced in May, villagers who had only recently replanted crops destroyed by floods were caught off guard by Typhoon Talim, which roared through Anhui and Jiangxi provinces over 3-4 September." "Even more unusual," the Update continues, "have been the floods that occurred 8-9 November in Jiangxi’s Jiujiang City, which affected 260,000 people in 13 counties, submerged rice and cotton crops and left more farmers wondering how they will provide their families with food in the coming months." The China Red Cross distributed rice and quilts to 100,000 of the victims of the November floods, but worse was yet to come for Jiujiang. A November 26 earthquake, with its epicentre in nearby Ruichang City, killed 16 people and injured 8,000, destroying 150,000 homes in Jiangxi, also affecting parts of Hubei and Anhui. The China Red Cross has released tents and quilts from a Disaster Preparedness Centre in Hubei and is appealing for aid to provide temporary sanitation facilities.