Growing cities, overuse of fertilizers and factory wastewater have degraded China's water supplies to the extent that half the nation's rivers and lakes are severely polluted. China aims to spend $850 billion to improve filthy water supplies over the next decade, but even such huge outlays may do little to reverse damage caused by decades of pollution and overuse in Beijing's push for rapid economic growth. Photo: Fishermen row a boat in the algae-filled Chaohu Lake in Hefei, Anhui province, June 19, 2009. (Photo by Jianan Yu/Reuters)

Traders try to control a camel at Pushkar Fair where animals, mainly camels, are brought to be sold and traded in the desert Indian state of Rajasthan November 6, 2016. (Photo by Himanshu Sharma/Reuters)

“Catch of the Decade”. Can you guess what happened next? Photo location: Katmai National Park, Alaska, USA. (Photo and caption by Aaron Baggenstos/National Geographic Photo Contest)

A Southwest Airlines jet takes off from Reagan National Airport with a thunderhead to the east on June 20, 2017 in Alexandria, VA. (Photo by Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post)

A seagull flies through a rainbow near the Savannah River and the open spillway at Thurmond Dam in Clarks Hill, SC, Monday, January 4, 2016. (Photo by Michael Holahan/Augusta Chronicle via AP Photo)

A rainstorm moves over the Atlantic Ocean after passing through Camden, Maine, at sunset, Tuesday, August 1, 2023. (Photo by Robert F. Bukaty/AP Photo)

Before sunrise there is a “Turneresque” sky over the abbey at the picturesque Wiltshire, England market town of Malmesbury on June 11, 2023. (Photo by Terry Mathews/Alamy Live News)

Some wave over the rainbow – a splash of colour is captured in spray over the sea wall at Totland Bay on the Isle of Wight off the south coast of England on February 16, 2022. (Photo by Jamie Russell/Bournemouth News)