TIME FOR DRASTIC ACTION

BUSINESSES AROUND ERHAI LAKE SHUT DOWN TO SAVE NATURAL DRAW

Hundreds of restaurants and guesthouses around the Erhai Lake, a popular tourist

spot in Yunnan province’s Dali Bai autonomous prefecture have been asked to suspend business to protect the environment. The food businesses around the lake, about 90 percent of which operated illegally, have been the main source of pollution in the lake. The burst of blue-green algae in the lake in January, a sign of eutrophication, is cause for alarm, and if the authorities don’t pay enough attention to the negative influence of tourism-related industries in the area, the lake will become a smelly pool, as it was about 20 years ago, when industrial waste and overuse of pesticides caused serious pollution.

Clockwise from top: Some experts believe garlic farming around the lake is one of the main sources of the pollution; a pleasure ground is shut down due to the lack of tourists; more than 100 innkeepers gather around a tree in the hope of returning to their businesses.

From left: Tourists ride on scooters along the Erhai Lake; some visitors take photos outside a hotel, which used to a popular selfie-taking spot; some teenagers still swim in the lake, thinking little of the pollution.

Several days after the suspension order, only one hotel on the western banks of the lake still keeps its light on.