Heavy pollution of river Yangtze

Large quantities of waste are being dumped every day into China's longest river and thus fore having extremely negative consequences for its aquatic life, according to the first annual health report on the Yangtze River. This river which is world's third longest river has become real example of natural disaster, worsening of water quality and loss of biodiversity, as the Yangtze River Conservation and Development Report 2007 reports.

Yangtze River

This study showed that one tenth of the river is already in critical condition. About 30 % of river's major tributaries like Minjiang, Tuojiang, Xiangjiang and Huangpu are heavily polluted by massive quantities of ammonia, nitrogen, phosphorous and other pollutants which are causing significantly smaller fish catch. Annual harvest of fish aquatic products dropped from 500 000 tons in the 50s to about 100 000 tons in 90s. Fishermen are even afraid to eat fish when they manage to catch some because of heavy pollution. Only last year 26 billion tons of waste was dumped into the river which runs through 11 provinces.

This report was created by experts from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Yangtze River Water Resources Commission affiliated to the Ministry of Water Resources, and the World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF) China.