BEIJING, April 8 (Xinhua) -- Natural disasters across China claimed 141 lives and left another 83 people missing from January to March, the Ministry of Civil Affairs (MCA) announced on Monday.

Affecting a total of 52.76 million people, disasters forced the evacuation of 253,000 people and toppled some 34,000 houses, according to a statement jointly released by the MCA and the National Commission for Disaster Reduction.

The disasters caused direct economic losses of 23.1 billion yuan (3.72 billion U.S. dollars) and affected more than 5 million hectares of farmland, destroying crops on 350,100 hectares of farmland.

Droughts, hailstorms, earthquakes and landslides were the main natural disasters hitting the country in the first quarter of the year, the statement said, adding that the overall damage incurred was more severe than that of last year's disasters.