North China's Shanxi Province reported 151 deaths from geological disasters, mostly in mining accidents, in the past five years, a local official has said.

In the period, the province witnessed 362 geological disasters, 70 percent of which were caused by mining, Fan Duixiang, executive vice governor of Shanxi, told a recent working conference on land and resources.

Sinking area reached 3,000 square km due to coal exploitation in Shanxi, a major Chinese province for coal production, affecting 1.6 million people, Fan said.

"Decades of continuous and intense mining have increased the chances of geological disasters in Shanxi," he said.

Shanxi has also reported severe loss of water and soil and frequent landslides of loess, a yellowish soil, due to its locations on the Loess Plateau.

In 2005, 24 people died from loess landslides in Jixian County of Shanxi, according to the provincial Land and Resources Department.

Zhang Huaiwen, director of the department, has vowed to intensify geological survey and monitoring of areas susceptible to geological disasters.

Source: Xinhua