‘National Drought’ Declared In China Amid Rising Heatwave

China issued its first ‘National Drought’ alert on August 19. This has come after 66 rivers dried up in the country’s southwest. Besides, heatwave induced mainly by forest fires poses a huge threat to the crops. To counter the current crisis situation, China has announced financial aid, cloud seeding and shutting down of certain energy-intensive industries. Meanwhile, rainfall in southern China has gone down by 60% this year.