Rural Water Worries Persist After Chinese Chemical Spill

On November 13, an explosion at a petrochemical plant spilled 100 tons of benzene and nitrobenzene in the Songhua River. 200 miles downstream from Jilin City, where the spill occured, is Harbin. Fortunately the four million citizens that live in Harbin were informed that their water supply would be restored by Sunday evening. Unfortunately, there are several people that live in rural areas outside Harbin that will be without water for much longer. Liu Shiying is one of the people that lives in the rural areas. She says that their water has been off for four days already and only has one clay cistern filled with water for her and her family. The citizens in Harbin were given plenty of bottled water to get through this hard time. Liu said that they would see on tv that water was delivered to the people in the city. The water supply for the people in the rural areas comes from underground wells or straight from the river, both of which have been contaminated by the spill. The only way to get water to these people is to take the dirt and gravel roads away from the city. The Shiying's are not expecting water to be delivered because they live so far away from the. They are just concerned about the little water supply they have left and when they will be able to drink from their well.

Is it possible to pull some economic concepts into this situation? Would the Shiying's be able to trade water with some of their neighbors or find some other way to ration out their water?