A 77-year-old man in Liuyang, Hunan province, became a father recently.

Ning Jianyou's wife Xiao Wen, 40, gave birth to a son through Caesarean section in the city's hospital for women and children on Nov 23.

Ning's son, who weighed 3.2 kg at birth, is healthy, doctors said.

Ning, a farmer in the city's Wutian village, is probably the oldest person to become a father in the city.

Xiao Wen, a deaf and dumb woman, is Ning's fourth wife.

(Sanxiang Metropolis Daily)

Vegetables are sick – Hunan Liuyang cadmium pollution

November 21st, 2009

(picture: A polluted eggplant)

[Southern Metropolis Daily] In July and August of this year, the Hunan Liuyang cadmium pollution incident caused nationwide concerns. It has been three to months since the incident, chemical plant was permanently closed, the relevant officials were suspended from their positions and affected farmers also received a certain amount of compensation. Recently the photographer went back to Liuyang, to some of the affected areas and shot a set of portraits for the crops. These terminally ill fruits and vegetables tell us the disaster has not yet ended.

 

Vegetables are sick – Hunan Liuyang cadmium pollution

By Southern Metropolis Daily reporter Fang Qianhua

 

 

July of this year my partner Yang Xiaohong and I went to Liuyang in Hunan province together to cover the incident of cadmium pollution. Centered at Xianghe chemical factory which was the source of the cadmium pollution, the fields within 1.5 kilo-meter radius were seriously polluted with cadmium.

At the time, the amount of the cadmium content in majority of the villagers’ body seriously exceeded the standard level. Some of them were very young babies. Apart from this, large tracts of contaminated farmland and crops were too horrible to look at. Those once familiar fruits and vegetables in the field became grotesque and disfigured beyond recognition, making people feel nausea and fearful when looking at them.

November of this year I once again returned back to the polluted areas to investigate and found many farmland were deserted, rarely seen crops. However after walked through many villages we could still see some remaining fruits and vegetables in the corners of the deserted fields. Because they were never cleared away, after a few months of pollution they have become more deformed, more shocking. In order to find crops suitable for the photo shoot, I went there 4 times to couple of the villages to look for those polluted vegetables. To me, these deformed and sick fruits and vegetables are like a group of special patients.

Photography: Fang Qianhua

Video: Qiao Yanjie