An official from south China's Guangdong Province has assured Macao of water supply until Spring next year, the Macao Daily Times reported Monday.

      During the Seminar on "Conserving Water and Combating Salt Tide in Zhuhai and Macao" last Sunday, Guo Zhongqiu, Director of the Ocean and Fisheries Bureau of Zhuhai, southern Guangdong Province, said the third round of water transfer has been launched. All the standby pumping machines in Pinggang Pumping Station have been in use and a total of 1,300,000 cubic meters of water is drawn daily.

      Macao Daily Times quoted him as saying that authorities are confident in securing water supply in Macao and Zhuhai according to the present situation. Since the construction of Zhuyin Reservoir is going to be completed by the end of next year, with its water capacity of 43,000,000 cubic meters, the needs of water supplied to Macao and Zhuhai can be met until 2020, provided that the economic development of both cities is at a pace like today's.

      Speaker of the seminar, Zhao Xiaolin, Assistant Chief Engineer of Pearl River Water Resources Commission (PRWRC), said that the water transfer project is a short-term measure. She said that authorities had to establish a controlled system of the basin apart from searching water sources in Zhuhai. She explained that the Datengxia Hydroelectric Project, which is to be constructed shortly, would be able to help Macao to solve such problem fundamentally.

      According to Zhao, the project is undergoing approval from the National Development and Reform Commission. The construction is expected to start at the end of this year, at the soonest, and is going to take nine years to complete.

      Speaking of the Datengxia Hydroelectric Project, Susana Wong Soi-man, Head of the Working Group on the Development of a Water Conservation Society, revealed that the government of Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) is going to sign a formal agreement on the granting of a financial assistance of 800 million RMB to support the project. Wong said that the amount would be mainly used for the relocation of residents and for the soil and water conservation in the affected areas due to the construction.

      Besides the Datengxia Project, which is a long-term measure to tackle the problem of Macao's water supply, the SAR government has already granted an interest-free loan of 450 million RMB to support the construction of Zhuyin Reservoir, which is comparatively an interim measure.