CHANGCHUN, JILIN - About 30,000 local residents of four townships in Nong'an county of Northeast China's Jilin province have been evacuated over fears a new round of downpours could cause more floods.

"Most of the evacuated people are now settled in schools and rest centers," Wang Wei, deputy secretary of the local party committee told China Daily on early Thursday.

However, a shortage of drinking water, food and shelters is still threatening at least 12,000 people in Nong'an, Wang added.

About 1,700 officials, soldiers and residents have joined the rescue work.

As of late Wednesday, at least 51 reservoirs have been damaged because of floods, pushing up the total direct economic loss in Jilin to over 13.8 billion yuan ($2.0 billion) this year, according to the local authorities.