BEIJING: Heavy rainfall across large parts of China has caused road damage totaling over 16 billion yuan ($2.24 billion), the Ministry of Transport reported on Wednesday. The preliminary estimate covers damage since the start of the flood season on July 1 and includes 23 provinces, regions, and municipalities.
The government has allocated approximately 540 million yuan in emergency road repair subsidies and 5.8 billion yuan in disaster relief funding since April. In July alone, floods, landslides, earthquakes, and droughts resulted in direct economic losses of 52.2 billion yuan.
Local governments, already burdened with significant debt, are facing increased difficulty absorbing the mounting climate-related damages, further stressing public finances.
