China earmarks 360m yuan to support disaster relief

BEIJING -- China on Friday allocated 360 million yuan ($53.74 million) in advance from its central natural disaster relief funds to help local governments with flood control and disaster relief, the Ministry of Emergency Management said Saturday.

Some 340 million yuan was earmarked for 12 southern provincial-level regions, including Hunan, Guangxi and Guizhou, to help them with the search, rescue and relocation of affected people, emergency treatment, secondary disaster detection and the repair of damaged houses, the ministry said.

The remaining 20 million yuan was allocated to Northeast China's Liaoning province to solve the water shortage there.

Several rounds of rainstorms have battered the country's southern areas this year, triggering floods, landslides and mud-rock flows.

In May, floods damaged over 1,000 houses and affected 2.52 million people in 15 provincial-level regions, leaving 10 people dead or missing, according to the ministry.

Floods caused a direct economic loss of 5.09 billion yuan last month, up 35 percent from the average during the same period over the past five years.