According to the Voice of China’s National News Network, China Central Radio and Television, the Ministry of Water Resources recently stated that this year and next year, it will concentrate its efforts to increase the level of water supply for 60 million rural people and ensure that the drinking water safety problem for more than 800,000 poor people is solved by the end of this year.

At the end of 2018, my country has completed more than 11 million rural water supply projects, serving 940 million rural people, and the tap water penetration rate reached 81%. However, with economic and social development, rural water supply is also facing some outstanding problems. As of the end of 2018, the country still has 1.043 million poor people have drinking water safety problems. Tian Xuebin, deputy minister of the Ministry of Water Resources, said that this year and next, efforts will be concentrated on improving the level of water supply for the 60 million rural population. “For provinces with heavier tasks, we will formulate a plan, keep a close eye on it, and take extraordinary measures to focus on advancement, so as to ensure that the drinking water safety problem of more than 800,000 poor people will be resolved by the end of this year and will be fully resolved next year.”

As rural water supply projects with less than 1,000 people account for more than 99%, most of them are located in mountainous, pastoral and remote areas, resulting in poor sustainability of the operation of some projects. Tian Xuebin said that rigid measures will be taken to establish a financial subsidy mechanism to promote the establishment of a long-term project management and protection mechanism; to guide and urge all localities to adopt measures such as water source replacement, water purification treatment and remote poverty alleviation to speed up the resolution of the problem of excessive drinking water fluorine.