Witness villagers' life in drought-hit Napo County of Guangxi Province

The government sends water trucks to deliver water to the villages and towns

"Even the county town has a lack of water, you can imagine what the situation in the mountain villages is like," said Nong Shidu. 　

Every day, the local government will send over 50 water trucks to deliver water to the villages and towns from the water distribution points. Longhe Township, which is located in the mountain area in the southwest of Napo County, is over 30 kilometers away from the county and is surrounded by mountains. The mountain road to the township is narrow and steep, and doesn't have a creek running beside it. On both sides of the road, we could not see the air of vitality in the vast terraced areas that we should have seen in spring. Through the dry wheat and corn, we saw bare, dry land. Since the drought, villagers had been looking forward to the water trucks bringing groundwater from Shanhe Village, Pohe Town. 　　

"Now I wash my face every few days," said Chen Hongyan, a villager in Guolintun, Zhonghe Village, Longhe Township, who sat in her dim log cabin. Her whole family of seven depends on the water in two approximately 25L liter buckets sitting in front of the cooking range. Villagers must save and store water. They only wipe their bodies and never bathe fully. The leftover water will be used to feed the pigs and chicken. "As a result of lack of water, even the rice cannot grow here, so we only seed the corn. But now the corn cannot live and we have to wait for the rain." 　　

Huang, deputy head of Longhe Township, said that the annual income of Zhonghe Village is about 1000 yuan per capita. Because there are more mountains and less land, only 1 mu of land was allocated to a person. Due to the drought, villagers harvested nothing from the cornfields on which they live, so they have nothing to do but maintain their livelihood by raising pigs and chickens. "A pig that had been raised for one year was only sold for about 1100 yuan."

In order to ensure sufficient water supply, water trucks bring water from Shanhe Village of Pohe Township every two days. Seeing the water trucks with red banners coming from afar, villagers who have been patiently waiting at the village entrance immediately became excited, fighting to fetch water with their bottles and pots.

"In the past, no one would send water for us, so we had to go to Dengya Village to fetch water. We had to cross two mountains and walk for about two and a half hours to get to the village. Since the drought however, the water-level of the river in Dengya Village lowered to ankle-deep from knee-deep and we did not have a place to fetch water. Thanks the government, we now have water sent to us without being charged the water rate," Jin Ye, a villager who has a family of five, said with gratitude.

Due to the winding mountain road, many villagers from Longhe Township keep horses for transportation that can carry two jugs of water every time. "Because it is too dry, villagers do not have grass to feed them so they are set free for some time to rummage around by themselves." Yesterday, among the 10-plus horses in Guolintun, only three are able to carry water. "An old horse in the village died of overworking several days ago, after it continually delivered water for several months to its master and the households who enjoy the 'five guarantees.'" The township head and many villagers told reporters the unusual news.