By ways of economizing, controlling and regulating the water resource, the province expects to have sufficient water supply to itself and Taiwan province during years of drought.

The per-capita possession of water is 3826 cubic meters, 15 times the national average. However, due to uneven distribution of rainfalls in terms of time and space, its southeastern seaboard and islands are short of water. Some areas suffer water shortage because of water pollution.

The province is now short of 1.222 billion cubic meters of water and the figure will rise to 6.8 billion cubic meters by 2010.

It will establish a water-economy management system and operational mechanism and attain economy and protection of the water resource by legal, economic, administrative, technical and educational means. The structural waste of water in the process of production or consumption will be eliminated.

Fuzhou and Quanzhou are thinking of reforming the water price and Xiamen that is short of water resource is trying to popularize water-saving utensils and will launch China’s biggest sea water purification project that will yield 5000 tons of fresh water a day.

(www.cenews.com.cn March 24, 2003)