On Monday Danwei posted an excellent piece by Rachel Beitarie about the current situation in Tiger Leaping Gorge entitled Media and the future of Tiger Leaping Gorge.

The story revolves around the plan to build a Three Gorges-scale dam on the Jinsha River in the majestic Tiger Leaping Gorge, about 150 km from Lijiang, plus the sociological and environmental damage that would result.

Yu Xiaogang, founder of Kunming-based NGO Green Watershed is featured in the story. For those who were wondering about the answer to whether the dam plan will go through, Yu seems certain that it will:

'Yu admits however, that whilst he hopes for a shift in the government policy for future project, the construction of this particular dam is probably now unstoppable.'

Another sobering observation later in the story about the farmers that would be displaced by such a dam:

'So the choice of these now relatively affluent farmers is to become marginalized urban residents with no land, or try to make a living in a harsh mountainous area, with fewer resources.'

China has 85,000 dams, or 46 percent of the world total. Those dams cannot be undone. Damming Tiger Leaping Gorge would be tragic for many reasons, the biggest one being: It doesn't have to happen.

Image: Warrior Tours