|
(CNN)Khorsheeda Khatun had been left with nothing -- then that too was washed away. Khorsheeda Khatun已经一无所有，所有的一切都被冲走了。  The 28-year-old fled her home country of Myanmar in January with her two daughters, escaping the latest outbreak of violence, and was living in the Kutupalang Makeshift Settlement in Bangladesh when cyclone Mora arrived five months later and displaced up to 500,000 people. "My house was shattered. It broke the wooden planks supporting my hut and blew away the polythene rooftop. The wind and water destroyed whatever little possessions we had," she told UNICEF workers in June. 为了逃避最近爆发的暴力事件，28岁的她在今年一月份带着她的两个女儿逃离了她们的祖国缅甸，并在孟加拉国的Kutupalang Makeshift安顿了下来。然而五个月后，旋风Mora横扫了那里，并使得当地的50万人流离失所。 她在六月份对儿童基金会的工作人员表示：“我的房子破碎了，风击碎了支撑我小屋的木板，并将塑料屋顶吹走，暴风雨带走了我们仅存的一点点财富。” Several weeks later, across the Himalayas in South China, over 12 million people were forced to flee their homes as flood waters rose for yet another year. In China's southeastern Jiangxi province alone, flooding this year has so far caused $430 million in damages and economic losses. In neighboring Hunan province, 53,000 homes have been destroyed -- and the flooding has yet to fully recede. Increasingly severe weather, triggered by climate change, is putting hundreds of millions of people at risk across the rapidly developing countries of southern Asia. 几个星期后，在喜马拉雅山脉的另一边，中国的南方地区，超过一千二百万的人们因为一年一度的洪水而被迫逃离家园。 仅在中国江西省的东南部地区，今年的洪灾就造成了4.3亿美元的直接及经济损失。 在与其相邻的湖南省，已有5.3万户住房被摧毁，且水淹尚未完全消退。 气候变化所引发的天灾，正使得南亚迅速发展中的国家的数亿人面临着巨大的风险。 A man using an improvised flotation device in floodwaters in Liuzhou, Guangxi in July 2017. 2017年7月柳州，一个人正用自制的漂流设备在洪水中移动。 "In the next 30 years, it is projected that heavy rainfall events will be increasing ... in Asia, by about 20% for sure," climate scientist Dewi Kirono at Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) told CNN. Southern Asia is already the wettest area on the continent and one of the wettest regions in the world, receiving an average of at least 1000mm of rainfall a year. As the rains fall harder, more than 137 million people in India, Bangladesh and China will be put at risk of coastal or inland flooding, more people than in the rest of the Asia-Pacific combined, a study in 2012 found. 澳大利亚联邦科学和工业研究组织（CSIRO）的气候科学家Dewi Kirono在2012年的一项研究中发现，在接下来的三十年中，亚洲的大雨将会增加约20％。“南亚已是亚洲最潮湿的地区，也是世界上最潮湿的地区之一，平均每年至少有1000毫米的降雨量。随着降雨的增多，印度，孟加拉国和中国的13700多万人将面临沿海或内陆洪灾的风险，受灾人数将比亚太地区的其他地区加起来都要多。 Aggravating flooding through poor drainage and short-sighted planning is the sprawling, rapid urban growth across South Asia, built to accommodate the millions of rural residents moving to cities. "You still have to have proper draining. It was a green field and now it's an urban area. Quite often, if you don't do that, (because) you've concreted everything the flood run-off is so much higher and the deaths are much worse," Oxford University visiting fellow and WWF advisor Paul Sayers told CNN. 当今南亚国家迅速发展，大量的居民迁入城市，但匮乏的排水系统和短视的规划却远远跟不上需要。（话说，我们为什么就变成了南亚的居民了？） “你还是要正确的规划排水系统，这是城市绿化的一部分。如果不做好这些，当洪水来临的时候就会造成更大的损失及人员伤亡。“牛津大学访问学者和世界自然基金会顾问保罗·塞勒斯（Paul Sayers）告诉CNN。 'A dead city'死城The majority of flood-related deaths and injuries worldwide since 1950 have been in three countries: China, India and Bangladesh. According to statistics from Belgium's Universite Catholique de Louvain's Emergency Events Database, since 1950, more than 2.2 million people in these countries have been killed by flooding. That includes the estimated two million people who died during the disastrous 1959 floods in China. 1950年以来，全球大多数与洪水有关的人身伤亡事件都发生在三个国家：中国，印度和孟加拉国。 据比利时天主教大学紧急事件数据库统计，自1950年以来，这些国家有220多万人因水灾而死亡。这包括中国1959年洪灾中死亡的二百万人。（直接说自1959年以来中国水灾中死的人最多不就好了么……） The world's leading authority of climate change, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), wrote in its latest report the Asia region was already suffering "huge economic losses" from weather and climate disasters, with one quarter of the entire world's economic losses from disasters in Asia alone. As flood swept through central China in July 2017, leaving devastation in its wake and almost 90 people dead or missing, locals took to Weibo to express their horror. "The road is blocked, the electricity is downed, water is polluted, no phone signal is detected, elderly (people) and children are waiting for food," said one user living in Shilong Village in Hunan province. 政府间气候变化专门委员会（IPCC）在世界领先的气候变化权威机构在其最新报告中写道，亚洲地区已经遭受了天气和气候灾害的“巨大经济损失”，全球经济损失的四分之一来自 亚洲的灾难。 洪水在2017年7月份席卷中国中部地区并造成了灾难性后果，近90人死亡或失踪，当地人在微博上表示了他们的恐惧。 一个居住在湖南省石龙村的用户说：“路被堵塞，水被污染，没有电话信号，老人（人）和小孩都在等待食物。 People swim past the top of a pagoda at a flooded riverside park in Wuhan on Monday, July 3 7月3日，武汉民众游过一个江边公园的亭子顶。 Photos accompanying the post showed cracked walls, piles of trash and mud everywhere. "The major district has turned to a dead city," another user said. Almost every year in the past decade, more than 1,000 people have died in China, India and Bangladesh from flooding, according to the Database, and millions of dollars in damage has been done. 随附的照片显示了破裂的墙壁，堆砌的垃圾和泥土到处。 另一位用户说：“重灾地区已经变成了一个死城。 根据数据库显示，过去十年中的每一年，中国，印度和孟加拉国，几乎每年都会有1000多人死亡，以及数百万美元的损失。 Flood plains洪泛平原 The problem centers around three of the great Himalayan rivers of South and East Asia: The Ganges, Brahmaputra and Yangtze. About 500 million people, or 50% of the population in India and Bangladesh, and about 300 million people, or about 25% of the population of China, live within the flood basins of these three rivers. Taken together, the three waterways support an estimated 14% of the world's total population. In China alone, the enormous Yangtze flood plain, full of fertile soil and easy river access, is responsible forabout 40% of China's GDP. 问题的中心地带刚好集中在在南亚和东亚三大喜马拉雅支流上：恒河，雅鲁藏布江和长江。 印度和孟加拉国有大约5亿人口，约占这两个国家总人口的50%；及中国的3亿人口，约占中国人口的25％，都居住在这三大河流流域，占了世界总人口的14％。 仅在中国，长江流域的富饶地区的经济产出，占中国GDP的40％。 Rescue workers helping people on a flooded street in Loudi, Hunan province, in July 2017. 2017年7月，湖南娄底，救生员在淹水的街道中帮助人们。 "Many Asian cities, and especially some megacities, have been built in the deltas of major rivers where ports could link the cities to the global economy," a report by the Asian Development Bank in 2012 said. When the heavy rains higher up in the flood plains flow into these rivers, water levels rise dramatically -- and floodwaters pour into the surrounding cities and towns. For example, this year, torrential rains caused a Yangtze tributary in Hunan to rise a record 3.2 meters above the warning level, bursting its banks and swamping crops and houses. Still, these factors have been here for years. Why is the danger growing now? 亚洲开发银行2012年的一份报告说：“许多亚洲城市，特别是一些大城市，都建立在河流三角洲之上，港口可以将城市与全球经济联系起来。 但当大雨流入这些河流时，其水位会急剧上升，洪水便会流入周围的城镇。 例如，今年暴雨导致湖南长江支流达到高于警戒水平3.2米，推倒银行，农作物和房屋。 不过，这些因素多年来一直都有， 为什么现在的威胁正在增长？ Concrete and drains混凝土及下水道 Flooding in urban environments is more costly in terms of lives and loss of property because without a natural way to disperse the floodwaters they can cause damage"beyond the scope of the actual (flood)," experts say. "A lot of the urbanization ... has happened in a largely unplanned matter. For instance they don't have risks adequately taken into account, they don't invest enough in sustainable drainage," Abhas Jha, the World Bank sector manager for Transport, Urban and Disaster Risk Management for East Asia and the Pacific, said. Of course the huge rush of rural residents to China and India's cities hasn't helped, as cities expand deeper into floodplains and build hurriedly to accommodate their citizens. When Mao Zedong, the founder of the People's Republic of China died in 1976, just 17% of the country lived in major cities. As of 2016, according to the World Bank, it is now over 56%. 专家说，洪水对城市环境中造成的生命和财产损失变得越来越昂贵，因为没有自然的方式来驱散可能造成损害的“溢出部分”。 世界银行行业经理Abhas Jha说：“很多城市化在一个很大的程度上是无计划事件，例如没有充分考虑到风险，他们在可持续排水方面投入不足。” 东亚及太平洋地区运输，城市和灾害风险管理表示。 当然，随着巨大的人口迁移，中国及印度不得不将城市朝着洪泛平原推进，并快速的建立新的城市以安置日益增加的城市人口。 根据世界银行的数据，当中华人民共和国创始人毛在1976年去世时，中国的城市人口只占了当时人口的17％。而截至2016年为止，城市人口已超过了56％。 
India, which started from a similar point as China, has doubled the size of its urban population, with 33% of its people in large cities. "City level decision makers now (love) concrete, they like to invest in hard infrastructure, but what we realize is that part of the problem of urban flooding is that you need to get the balance right," Jha said. As natural drainage, such as open green spaces and wetlands, are covered in cityscapes and replaced with inadequate artificial alternatives, heavy rain has nowhere to go. And the rains are getting heavier. 与中国相似，印度的城市人口规模也翻了一番，城市人口已占了总人口的33％。 “城市层面的决策者喜欢水泥建筑的基础设施，但是我们应该意识到，城市淹水问题的一部分是需要在人文及自然中找到平衡点。” 当开阔的绿地和湿地都被城市景观所覆盖，并以不适当的人工替代物替代，大雨无处可去，自然会形成危害。 重要的是，降雨量越来越大了。 The dangerous climate危险天气Jha said if you want to see evidence of the effects of climate change, just look back five years in Asia. "Mumbai, Shanghai, Hanoi, Beijing, Phnom Penh -- every major city in Asia has had a major flooding event so there's no doubt about it that the situation is getting worse," he said. The expected impacts of climate change on the world's weather are well documented. Hotter temperatures, higher sea levels and heavier rain should all be expected, Kirono, the CSIRO expert, said. But rather than more days of rain in a year, she said climate change will just cause more severe, torrential rainfall. 贾哈说，如果你想看到气候变化影响的证据，那么回顾亚洲近来的这五年吧。 他说：“孟买，上海，河内，北京，金边，亚洲每个主要城市都发生了大型水灾事件，所以毫无疑问，情况是越来越糟了。 气候变化对世界天气的预期影响是很明显的。 KIROO CSIRO专家说，温度越高，海平面上升越大，雨量越大。这并非意味着一年中会多下雨，而是意味着更严重的暴雨。 "A heavy rainfall event means unusually high precipitation over the course of one day or one hour, which increases the chances of flooding," she said. "Of course, heavy rainfall does not cause floods per se, because it depends on the topography and the infrastructure of the city." It isn't just the initial floods which could put lives in danger across Asia, Kirono said. The aftermath could be just as deadly. "It could be waterborne diseases which like having high temperatures because one degree or half degree will make their environment livable," she said. But climate change may not even be driving the most severe flooding in Asian metropolises, new research suggests. 她说：大量的降水事件意味着一天或一个小时内的异常降水，也增加了淹水的机会。 “当然，暴雨本身并不会造成洪水，因为这取决于城市的地形和基础设施。” Kirono说，不仅仅是最初的洪水可能使亚洲各地处于危险之中。 后果也可能同样致命。 “像是温度变化而带来的水源性疾病，因为一度或半度都有可能改变他们的生在环境”她说。 但最新的研究表明，气候变化而引起的洪水或许并不会给亚洲的大都市带来灭顶之灾。 Not changing fast enough应对措施不足 Both local and regional changes will be needed if increasingly severe floods across Southern Asia are going to be avoided in the future, all experts agreed. For large established cities there are two options, according to Jha -- physical infrastructure to keep the water away from citizens and preventative measures to keep people away from the water. "Preparedness, early warning systems, green infrastructure, things like that ... we've found that early warning systems are perhaps the best investment that a country and a city can make," he said. "A dollar invested in early warning systems can save four to eight dollars in avoided losses later on." 所有专家都同意，如果想要避免南亚洪水泛滥，那么所有的城市及地区都需要改变。 对于大型城市需要遵循两个原则：1是远离洪泛区，或是居民点远离洪泛区。 “建立早期预警系统，植被覆盖区域，类似之类...我们发现，预警系统也许是一个国家和一个城市可以做出的最好的投资。” 投资早期预警系统的1美元可以避免四至八美元的损失。 It isn't likely to come cheap. A study in 2010 found it would cost more than $2.6 billion to adequately protect Bangladesh's roads, railways and drainage systems. But government officials have already attempted to mitigate the threat of extensive flooding in a number of ways, including China spending billions of dollars on a "sponge city" program, to help the urban sprawl absorb rainwater more efficiently. But, experts suggest local changes won't be enough though, and say flood basins in China, India and Bangladesh need to coordinate across cities to find the best locations for housing and to halt flooding in its path. "It isn't ideal to deal with water in urban areas," Jessica Lamond, associate professor in flood risk management at the University of the West of England, told CNN. Instead, Lamond said, cities should, where possible, deal with the water in higher catchment areas and slow its approach into urban areas. Worryingly, WWF adviser Sayers insists not nearly enough is being done to avoid much more death and damage in the future. "If you don't do that preparation you're basically resigning yourself to a future you're constantly going to be responding to major events, and to worse events," he said. 当然了，这样的一套预警系统不太可能便宜。根据 2010年的一项研究，为了充分保护孟加拉国的道路，铁路和排水系统，这套系统将花费超过26亿美元。 但是，政府官员已经试图通过多种方式来减轻洪灾的威胁，包括中国在“海绵城市”计划上花费数十亿美元，帮助城市扩张更有效地吸收雨水。 但是，专家认为，单个地方的变化是不够的，中国，印度和孟加拉国的洪水流域需要在各个城市之间协调一致，并找到最好的住房区域以及停止洪水的路线。 英国西部大学洪水风险管理副教授杰西卡·拉蒙特（Jessica Lamond）对CNN说：“在城市地区处理水是不理想的。 相反，Lamond说，城市应尽可能处理较高集水区的水域，并将其引入城市。 令人担忧的是，世界自然基金会顾问赛勒斯坚持认为，未来几乎没有足够的时间来避免洪水将造成的更多的死亡和损失。 他说：“如果你不做好准备工作，你基本上就是跟自己的未来说拜拜了，因为你将不断地面对重大及更糟糕的事件。 |
|
|
