BEIJING: A Chinese river basin where 110 million people live has been hit by the worst floods since 1963 despite massive mitigation efforts, particularly during the rule of Mao Zedong, overwhelmed by the impact of global warming and outdated infrastructure.
In response, Mao Zedong, the founder of modern China, ordered that millions work to bring the Hai river basin under"permanent control", raising thousands of kilometres of embankments and building new reservoirs and reinforcing old ones.Since then, China's urban population has soared, from just 16 per cent of the population to 64 per cent in 2022. The Hai basin is now home to 25 large and medium-sized cities.
China's Soviet-era urban drainage systems of shallow buried pipes leave cities vulnerable to waterlogging during heavy rain, in contrast with cavernous underground storm"corridors" in cities such as Tokyo. But many Zhuozhou residents told state media they were not informed about the severity of the situation or told to evacuate, despite the rare warning.