RECENT devastating floods in China concentrated anxious attention on the Yangzte River, but flood defenses along the river are in good shape, according to yesterday’s China Daily. Wang Shucheng, minister of water resources, was quoted by the paper as saying the thousands of kilometers of levees along the flood-prone Yangzte have already been massively reinforced, thanks to the country’s heavy expenditure on flood-control projects since 1998.In fact, authorities do not expect major reinforcement work will be needed along the levees for the next 50 to 100 years. Following 1998’s devastating floods which claimed 1,562 lives in five provinces along the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze, the Central Government poured 160 billion yuan (US$19.2 billion) into construction of water conservation projects, Wang said.

Yangtze defenses hold up

　　For the Yangtze alone, some 29 billion yuan (US$3.4 billion) was earmarked during the 1998-2002 period to consolidate the roughly 3,000-kilometer-long major levees shielding vast areas along the river’s middle and lower reaches. So far, no major flood-related mishaps have occurred along the main levees, even though the river has been hit by flood crests, according to the minister.By contrast, 4,150 people were killed across China during 1998’s summer floods which swept through China’s 29 provinces.In the latest on the floods, the flood crest of the Yangtze passed Wuhan, the capital city of Hubei Province, yesterday without causing any damage.(SD-Agencies)