Water pollution may have reached alarming levels in China, after three decades of industrialisation that lifted nearly half a billion people out of poverty, the Asian Development Bank said on October 18.
The Philippines-based lender said it is giving Beijing a 500,000-dollar grant to help the Asian giant design a system to manage water pollution that the bank said "may have already reached an alarming level across the country."
Aid would help Beijing reduce the "chemical oxygen demand discharge" by 10 percent from 2005 levels. The term measures the discharge of water pollutants, mostly by industrial manufacturers.
China moved towards rapid economic expansion from the late 1970s. Average annual gross domestic product growth of about nine percent has since lifted 450 million people out of absolute poverty, the bank said in a statement.
"Along with the rapid growth, however, the country has been faced with the increasingly difficult task of controlling environmental pollution, resources depletion and ecological degradation. "Despite government efforts and investment, the country has yet to arrest these problems," said ADB social sector economist Yue Fei.