Natural disasters affect over 8 mln in February

Natural disasters across China claimed 16 lives and affected more than 8.37 million people in February, according to official statistics released on Friday.

The Ministry of Civil Affairs and the National Commission for Disaster Reduction said in a report that about 72,000 people were forced to relocate and 75,000 people were in need of living assistance.

About 12,000 houses were destroyed and 91,000 damaged to varying degrees. Nearly 1.08 million hectares of farmland were affected, with 19,800 hectares unable to yield any crops, according to the report.

The disasters caused direct economic losses of 3.4 billion yuan (about 560 million US dollars).

Natural disasters in February were mainly earthquakes, while drought, extremely low temperatures, snow and forest fires also played their part.

The overall damage was lighter than the same period in recent years.