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)

A Pakistani monkey handler Naseer Khan plays flute to attract passers by for a monkey show to earn his living in Islamabad, Pakistan, Monday, September 7, 2015. (Photo by B. K. Bangash/AP Photo)

A Palestinian child receives food cooked by a charity kitchen amid shortages of food supplies in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip on February 20, 2024. (Photo by Mohammed Salem/Reuters)

A performer dressed as the Hindu Godess Kali takes part in a religious procession on the occasion of the Hindu festival of “Maha Shivaratri” in Pushkar on March 8, 2024. (Photo by Himanshu Sharma/AFP Photo)

A child puts his swimming goggles on before jumping in a public pool of spring water in Japakeh, Indonesia's Aceh province on March 22, 2024, during the World Water Day. (Photo by Chaideer Mahyuddin/AFP Photo)

A Palestinian carries a gas cooker as he walks amidst the debris of a destroyed building in the city of Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip on April 18, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and the militant Hamas group. (Photo by AFP Photo/Stringer)

American actress, producer and director Eva Longoria arrives for the screening of the film “Emilia Perez” at the 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival in Cannes, southern France, on May 18, 2024. (Photo by Antonin Thuillier/AFP Photo)

Hideki Tokoro, president of whaling company Kyodo Senpaku, boards Japan's new whaling mothership, the Kangei Maru, following the ship's launch ceremony at a port in Shimonoseki city, Yamaguchi prefecture on May 21, 2024. The nearly 9,300-tonne ship set sail on its maiden hunting voyage on May 21, heralding a new era for the controversial practice defended by the government as an integral part of national culture. (Photo by Yuichi Yamazaki/AFP Photo)