Staff members of State Grid Qinghai branch install a bulb at a prefabricated house of a temporary relocation site in Lajia Village, Guanting Township, Minhe County in Haidong City, northwest China's Qinghai Province, Dec. 22, 2023. [Photo/Xinhua]

Construction workers in Gansu province are racing against time to build prefabricated homes for residents affected by the recent magnitude 6.2 earthquake so that they can move from tents to warmer shelters before the upcoming New Year festival.

As of Monday morning, 8,793 prefabricated homes had been transported to the province's Linxia Hui autonomous prefecture, with 8,096 already being erected, local officials said at a news conference on Monday.

The quake, which mainly jolted Jishishan county in Linxia around midnight on Dec 18, has so far killed 149 people in Gansu and neighboring Qinghai province.

"More than 3,800 workers and over 1,000 items of machinery and equipment are involved in the construction work," Mao Hongbo, deputy head of the prefecture government, said at the news conference.

The prefecture plans to build 15,000 prefabricated homes, equipped with beds, bedding, stoves, electric heaters and carbon monoxide alarms, with the goal of providing a home for each family.

"We will make every effort to ensure the timely and efficient completion of the construction, to allow the affected people to welcome the New Year in warm accommodation," Mao said.

After moving into a warm home, Ma Zhiying, from Chenjia village, Jishishan county, immediately went to help his fellow villagers.

"We use tricycles to help each other transport daily articles between the tents and the prefabricated homes," said Ma.

Schools in the county fully resumed classes on Monday, and production and daily life are gradually returning to normal.

Han Shujun, a spokesman for the Gansu Provincial Emergency Management Department, said that the authorities have actively organized the resumption of classes and facilitated online teaching.

"We have one tent school at the centralized resettlement site of Dahejia town. Children from grade one to six are studying in the same tent," said Ma Yinglu, the principal of Dahejia Primary School.

A total of 1,136 teachers are currently working in 152 tent schools across the county.

Commercial establishments such as shopping malls, supermarkets, restaurants and e-commerce logistics centers have swiftly resumed operations. Market supplies are guaranteed, and circulation channels are unobstructed, meeting the consumption needs of the locals, said Han, the spokesman.

Various sectors of society had donated funds and supplies to support quake relief efforts.

According to Han, in order to facilitate smooth channels for donations and regulate the procedures for disaster relief contributions, the quake relief headquarters has established a provincial treasury account for donations and formed a dedicated team to receive, manage and allocate funds and materials at the provincial level.

As of Sunday, incomplete statistics indicate that a total of over 1.85 billion yuan ($260 million) has been received as donations by various sections of society and funds allocated by central departments and ministries.

On Monday, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Emergency Management allocated an additional 400 million yuan to support disaster-relief efforts in Gansu and Qinghai provinces.

The new batch of financial support brought the total quake-relief funds allocated by the central government to 1.1 billion yuan, with 845 million yuan aiding Gansu and 255 million yuan supporting Qinghai.

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