Natural disasters kill 1,851 in 2013

Natural disasters left 1,851 people dead and another 433 missing in China last year, inducing "obviously heavier" losses than those in the previous year, authorities have said.

Disasters affected over 388 million people and forced the relocation of 12.15 million, according to a statement jointly released on Monday by the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the National Committee for Disaster Reduction.

These disasters led to direct economic losses worth 580.84 billion yuan (95.2 billion US dollars), up 38.8 percent from the 418.55 billion reported in 2012, it said.

Some 875,000 houses were destroyed and more than 7.7 million damaged. Disasters affected nearly 31.35 million hectares of farmland, with over 3.8 million hectares yielding no crops at all.

The statement cited frequent extreme weather incidents including simultaneous floods and droughts as well as 43 earthquakes of magnitude 5 or above, compared with the annual average of 20 occurrences.

The ministry said it had sent six special teams to severely hit areas including the provinces of Jilin, Heilongjiang, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Shaanxi and Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region to help arrange wintering for locals.

According to the ministry, the central government allocated 5.84 billion yuan for disaster relief nationwide on Dec. 9, with more planned.