Shangba
Village in Guangdong, People's Republic of China
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Shangba is a village of about 3,300 people administered by Xinjiang Town in Wengyuan County, Guangdong.[1][2][3] It is an agricultural village, with rice and sugar cane being major crops. In 2007 the village acquired the nickname China's "Village of Death" [4] due to the extremely high incidence of cancer in its population.
Shangba
上坝村 | |
|---|---|
Village | |
  Shangba Location in Guangdong | |
| Coordinates: 24°27′39″N 113°48′48″E | |
| Country | People's Republic of China |
| Province | Guangdong |
| Prefecture-level city | Shaoguan |
| County | Wengyuan |
| Town | Xinjiang |
| Shangba | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional Chinese | 上壩村 | ||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 上坝村 | ||||||
| |||||||
In addition, the local river, the Hengshui River, known locally as "The Dead River", is Shangba's only water supply, and it has become so polluted that it is endangering the health[clarification needed] of those living nearby.[5] One of the major pollutants in the river and well water is lead, which a provincial research institute reported as being present in the well water at some fifteen times what the national government set as a maximum acceptable rate for drinking water.[6]
The presumed source of the pollution is the Dabaoshan Mine for zinc, once Asia's largest mine for this mineral. The village's crops are also highly contaminated.[7][8]
In 2020 it was reported that over 1 billion Yuan was spent on soil remediation and improved mining processes, reducing the level of pollutants considerably.[9]
