In a report in the mid-1990s, the UN panel on climate change predicted that global warming would leave southern China battling more rains, while the north and west of the country would suffer from an increasing drought problem.

 

This prediction now appears to have come through, as the typhoon season in China, which normally starts around July 27, but this year had moved forward to the 18th May with the first typhoon hitting the southern province of Guangdong. This is reported to be the earliest typhoon to hit Guangdong since 1949.

In general, the typhoons arrive earlier each year and they are stronger, and the area that they hit is wider and the length of time they last is longer too.

Natural disasters in China this year have killed 1,699 people and left more than 415 missing, the nation's Red Cross Society said last week. At least 1,300 of those have died in weather-related incidents from May to the end of July, the Chinese government reported earlier this month.

These figures was released before the arrival on Thursday last week of Saomai, the eighth typhoon of the season and the possibly the strongest storm to hit China in 50 years. Saomai has killed at least 214 people, mostly in the two eastern coastal provinces of Zhejiang and Fujian, according to figures released on Tuesday.

The president of the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute, Lester Brown, told AFP that the weather in China over the past few months was reflective of the worldwide extent of the problem of global warming.

"The emerging consensus in the scientific community is that higher temperatures bring more frequent and more destructive storms to China," Mr. Brown said.