Construction of water projects in rural Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, south China, has provided access to quality drinking water over the past five years for a further 5.33 million people.

Zhang Huode, deputy director of Guangxi regional water resources bureau, said the region had launched three projects to build quality drinking water projects for rural people since 1998.

So far, 833 water supply stations have been constructed in the region's townships and major villages.

Lack of access to quality drinking water has been a major problem in rural Guangxi. In some places people have to travel dozens of kilometers to fetch drinking water.

Guangxi regional government aims to provide the remaining 910,000 rural residents with access to quality drinking water and feed 40 percent of its villages with tap water over the next five years.

(Xinhua News Agency July 24, 2003)