The People Republic of China has used their indigenous cultural technological expertise to create a highly modernized invention, known as, the Lanzhou Waterwheel, which can irrigate over 1,800 hectares of land.
Invented by Mr. Duran Xu from Lanzhou Province in 1556 (the Ming Dynasty), the Lanzhou Waterwheel has been gradually perfected after successive improvements over the last 400 years.
According to Mr Young, who took participants of the International Cooperation Seminar on International Art Festival in Lanzhou, China, on a guided tour to the place, said the Lanzhou Waterwheel has a peculiar structure, exquisite handcraft and vigorous style; it raises water with skip bucket up to the canal for gravity irrigation while it is being propelled to turn round by automatic flow of water.
Lanzhou has been reputed as, “the Waterwheel Metropolis,” as up to 1,952,252 Waterwheels are still standpoint along the two banks of Yellow River, otherwise known as, ‘Mother River’ by the Chinese people in Lanzhou, which has assumed magnificent view.
The delegations from the 18 participating countries present were amazed at such a magnificent invention.
Nnaemeka Nwajagu
Reporting from Lanzhou, China