中國南水北調工程正式通水入北京

￡48bn scheme may provide relief to the parched north, but at what cost to the drought-ridden south and its displaced farmers?

這項耗資480億磅的工程或許可以減緩炎旱的北方的用水危機，但是被幹旱困擾的南方地區以及那裏的農民又爲此付出了多少代價呢？

On Friday afternoon, China quietly inaugurated one of the biggest engineeringprojects of all time: the South-North Water Diversion, a ￡48bn, 2,400km networkof canals and tunnels, designed to divert 44.8bn cubic metres of water annually from China's humid south to its parched, industrialised north.

在週五下午，中國悄然爲一直以來最爲重要的工程項目：南水北調揭幕。這項工程是一個耗資480億英鎊，全長2400公里的由運河與隧道組成的巨型網絡，旨在從溼潤的中國南方向炎熱的、工業化的北方每年轉移448億立方米的水。

At 2.32pm, the project's "middle line" officially began carrying water from the Danjiangkou reservoir in central China's Hubei province to Beijing – the distance from Corsica to London. The project, officials say, will save China from a water crisis that could set its development back years.

在下午2:32，南水北調的中線工程正式通水：從中國湖北省的丹江口水庫引水至北京－－這相當於從Corcica到倫敦的距離。官方認爲中國的用水危機會讓它的發展倒退許多年，而這項工程就將解決這個危機。

It has also destroyed Wang Yanhe's life. Wang was born near the Danjiangkou reservoirin 1979, married young and had two children – the family lived between a smallstream and a leafy hillside, and grew a variety of grains. In 2009, seven years after the project was approved, officials informed him that the reservoir's water levels were rising and that his village would be submerged. About 345,000villagers have been displaced by the project to date, and Wang soon became oneof them. The government gave him a home in the Heba New Migrant Village by adusty highway in rural Pingdingshan, a coal-rich municipality in neighbouring Henan province whose name translates to "flat mountain".

但這毀了Wang Yanhe的生活。Wang在1979年出生在丹江口水庫附近，年紀輕輕結了婚並有了兩個小孩——一家人在青山綠水之中生活，並種植有許多莊稼。在2009年，也就是在南水北調工程被批准七年後，官員告知他丹江口水庫的水位正在上升，他所生活的村莊會被淹沒。到目前爲止，已經有大約345，000名村民由於這項工程被重新安置，wang很快也成爲他們中的一員。政府給了他位於heba移居新村的一處住處，它位於平頂山郊區裏一條塵土飛揚的高速公路旁。平頂山是一座煤礦資源豐富的城市，位於鄰近的河南省內，它字面上的意思是“平的山”。

Then came the drought. This summer was Pingdingshan's driest in 63 years – Wang'scorn crop only grew to knee-height, forcing him to abandon his harvest."Nothing is as good as before," he said, chain-smoking cigarettes in his concrete-floored living room. His roof leaks; he can't speak the local cials promised him 0.2 acres of land, but only gave him 0.15. "After we arrived, we realised that the land was all dry," he said. “So it doesn't evenmatter what they promised us.”

這之後他便遭遇了乾旱。這個夏天是平頂山63年來最爲乾旱的一年，wang種植的玉米只長到膝蓋那麼高，這讓他無法收穫豐收。“沒有一樣東西是比以前好的”，他在鋪着水泥地板的新起居室裏不停地抽着煙說道。他的屋頂漏雨，他也無法說當地的方言。官員允諾會給他0.2英畝的土地，但是實際上只兌現了0.15英畝。“在我們到了那以後，我們才發現那裏的土地全是乾旱的”他說道“他們說要給我們土地說了等於沒說”

The Henan Daily newspaper announced the line's inauguration in a pithy microblog post on Friday. “Being a peoples' engineering project, in keeping with a frugal and pragmatic working style, celebratory activities will be kept as simple aspossible,” it said. "No officials will take part in the ceremonies."

河南日報週五在一則簡短的微博中對南水北調中線工程通水這一事件進行了的報導：“作爲一項民生工程，將繼續貫徹節儉務實作風，通水慶祝活動也將盡量簡化，各級領導將不參加儀式”

China's booming economy over the past three decades, coupled with a long-held mandateto "grow first, clean up later", has been cataclysmic for the country's once-bountiful lakes, rivers and aquifers. Morethan half of China's 50,000 rivers have vanished over the past two decades, according to China's first national census of water,published last year. About 70% of its remaining fresh water is polluted. "If wecontinue with our business-as-usual model, China will basically run out ofwater," said Feng Hu, a water analyst with the Hong Kong-based research group China Water Risk. "Itwon't have enough water to power its economy."

中國過去45年的飛速發展一直秉承着長期以來“先發展後治理”的原則，這對曾經美麗的山川河流都造成了災難性的破壞。根據去年發表的首份中國水資源普查公報顯示，已有超過半數的河流在過去30年間乾涸，大致70%的淡水被污染。“如果我們繼續我們之前的發展模式，中國的水資源將會耗盡”一位來自香港研究小組“chinawater risk”的水資源分析師，feng hu說道，“短缺的水資源將無法推進國家的經濟發展”

The project has roots in an off hand comment by Mao Zedong who, onan inspection tour in the early 1950s, said: "The south has plenty of water,but the north is dry. If we could borrow some, that would be good." Theproject has three sections: a1,150km eastern line, which runs from the lower Yangtze River to Tianjin; the middle line, from Danjiangkou to Beijing; and a western line, which could someday link the headwaters of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers across the high-altitude Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. The eastern line began delivering waterto coastal Shandong province last winter. The western line remains largely conceptual, so grand in scale that it may ultimately prove impossible to build.

這項工程的啓動源自毛澤東在50年代前期考察時臨時發表地一次評論，他說：“南方有着充裕地水資源但是北方卻很乾旱。倘若我們能從南方借點水到北方，那就太好了。”這項工程分爲三個部分：一條長達1150km，從揚子江至天津的東部線；從丹江口到北京的中部線；還有在將來某天能將揚子江與黃河的源頭穿越青藏高原連接起來的西部線。東部線在去年冬天已經開始向山東省沿海地區輸送水資源，而西部線還大大地停留在概念階段，過於龐大的設計規模或許會讓它最終無法被建造完成。

While the project could provide somemuch-needed relief, it "will never solve north China's water problem", said Jennifer Turner, director of the China Environment Forum at the Wilson Centerin Washington DC. She called the project a "Band-Aid" rather than a long-termsolution. "The challenge in the water sector, writ large, is that it is so hooked into supply-side management," she said. "It's like the engineers in China have a special tattoo that says 'nothing is too big' – they'll move watermassive distances rather than get deep and dirty into the mess of pushing effective water conservation."

“儘管這項工程能提供一些非常有用的幫助，但是它將永遠也無法真正解決中國北部的水資源問題”中國環境論壇的主任Jenniferturner在華盛頓特區的wilson中心如此說道。她將這項工程稱之爲“創可貼式的補救”，並不能成爲長遠的解決方案。“水務部門的挑戰很明顯是在於其與供應方管理之間的聯繫過於密切”她說道，“這就像是中國的工程師在身上紋了一個寫着‘沒有什麼大事是無法完成的'的特殊紋身，他們要跨越極長的距離去運輸水，卻不願意去深入到像建造有效的水資源保護區這樣的麻煩事中。”

In February,Qiu Baoxing, vice-minister of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, called the project unsustainable. "As thescale of the project gets bigger and the distance gets longer, it is more andmore difficult to divert water," he wrote. "Recycled water could replace diverted water. Most Chinese cities are capable of finding more water if we develop water desalination technology and collect more rain water."

二月，住房與城鄉建設部副部長qiu boxing稱這項工程是不可行的。“隨着這項工程的規模變得越來越大，輸水距離越來越長，傳送水資源也變得越來越困難。”他寫道，“再循環水能替代傳輸水，倘若我們能發展水脫鹽技術並且同時收集利用更多的雨水，大部分的中國城市都能夠因此得到更多的水資源。

Experts saythe south may no longer have enough water to spare. They say the project could decimate the Han River, an important tributary of the Yangtze – about 40% ofthe river's water will eventually be diverted north, despite acute water shortages that already plague the cities along its banks. In 2011, five months of drought in Hubei province left 315,000 people short of drinking water. The Danjiangkou reservoir dropped to four metres below "dead water" level,rendering it unusable. Speculation that the South-North Water Diversion project caused this year's drought grew so heated that state media issued a denial. "Henan province is the recipient of benefits from the (project)," Yang Biantong, aspokesman for Henan's flood control and drought relief department, told thePeople's Daily in late August. "Not only has it not had a negative effect, the (project) has also been extremely helpful."

專家指出南方地區或將不再擁有足夠的水資源。他們認爲該項目會使漢水，一條揚子江的主要支流的儲水量大幅減少——大約40%的降水將會被最終調往北方。而在此之前，嚴重的水資源短缺已經席捲了這條河流兩岸的城市。在2011年，時長五個月的湖北旱災造成315，000人缺少飲用水。丹江口水庫的水位線掉落到“死水”線四米以下，這讓它不能被使用。關於南水北調工程引起旱災的猜測日益高漲，甚至引起官媒出面否認。“河南省是這項工程的受益者”，河南洪水控制與乾旱救災部發言人yangbiantong在八月份對人民日報的記者說道，“這項工程不僅不會帶來任何危害，它還相當的有益。”

Christine Boyle, founder of Blue Horizon In sight and an expert on China's water issues, said the issue boils down to how one defines a addition to crippling weather droughts – periods of little rainfall – China is also suffering from economic droughts, which occur when the demand for wateroutstrips supply. "You can't say the South-North Water Diversion is causing a weather drought," she said. "But you can say it's intensifying an economic drought." Many Chinese farmers are already economically squeezed, andincreasingly erratic weather patterns, perhaps related to climate change –freezing winters, blistering summers, floods and droughts – are now pushing them into a state of emergency.

Christineboyle是bluehorizon insight 的創始人，也是中國水資源問題的一名專家，他認爲這個問題可以歸結到如何去定義乾旱。中國在經歷嚴重的自然旱災的同時，也在經受着經濟上的乾旱，而這發生在水資源供不應求的情況下。“你不能說南水北調造成了自然乾旱”，她說，“但是你可以說它加劇了經濟乾旱”。許多中國農民已經在經濟上受到擠壓，而目前越來越陰晴不定的天氣（這或許與氣候變化有關）－極寒的冬天，灼熱的夏天，洪水與乾旱－正在把他們逼向緊迫的境地。

The South-North Water Diversion project began sending emergency water supplies to Pingdingshan in mid-August and, according to the official newswire Xinhua, the diversion was asuccess. The middle line delivered more than 50m cubic metres of water to the city's Baiguishan reservoir over a month and a half, it said, "effectively relieving the scarce water supply of Pingdingshan city's one million-plus residents".

根據新華網的報導，南水被調工程在八月中旬已開始向平頂山成功運輸緊急供水。中部線在一個半月內向平頂山市的baiguishan水庫運輸水資源超過5000萬立方米，新華網寫道：“其有效緩解了平頂山市一百多萬居民的水資源匱乏問題”。

While that water has flowed into the taps of Pingdingshan's urbanites and the cooling systems of its coal-firedpower plants, farmers on the city outskirts have been left to fend for themselves. Chang Xiangdang, 40, lives with his family of six in Malou Village, population 1,000, a dense cluster of cinder block houses only a few hundred metres from the project's main channel. From his small patch of radish and cabbage, high concrete embankments stretch to the horizon and an arch-likesluice rises like a mirage. "The channel runs through our town, but there's noway to get the water, no gap in the wall," he said. Villagers rely on groundwater for bathing and cooking. In previous years, they could dig 20 metres to reach the aquifer. This year, even 80-metre wells are running dry.

儘管水被運送到平頂山市居民的水龍頭中，煤礦發電廠的冷卻系統中，在這座城市郊區的農民們卻沒有從中受益，他們只能靠自己想辦法。Changxiangdang，40歲，一家六口人住在malou村。這個人口1000的村落密集着用煤渣砌成的房屋，距離運輸主幹道不過幾百米。在chang的一小塊種植着蘿蔔和白菜的菜地邊，高聳的混泥土堤壩向地平線與拱狀水閘門延伸，就像一幅幻影。“這個水道穿越過我們鎮，但是我們不能去取水，因爲牆面沒有任何縫隙。”他說。村民依靠地下水來洗漱，燒菜。 在前幾年，他們挖20米深就能找到蓄水層，但是今年挖了80米深的水井也要乾了。

Chang said the lack of water has thrown his life into flux. Like Wang, the displaced farmer, he has given up on this year's corn harvest. His family has been subsisting on a compensation package that project officials gave him four years ago, when they requisitioned much ofhis farmland. Another dry summer, he says, would leave him destitute. He has considered taking a construction job in the city. "There's no more water here," he said. "I'll do what it takes to survive."

Chang說水資源的短缺已經將他的生活擾亂。像wang一樣，這位因南水北調工程而搬遷的農民放棄了今年的收成。他的家庭已經在靠四年前負責該項目的官員徵用他的農田時給予他的賠償金度日。他說下一個夏天如果還是乾旱的他將窮困潦倒。他已經在考慮去城市找一份建築工的工作。他說：“這裏沒有更多的水了，我得另尋生路。”