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Ministry of Water Resources: Accelerate the recovery of river and lake ecological environment and maintain the healthy life of river and lake

Today (September 13) afternoon, The State Council Information Office held a series of themed press conferences on the theme of "Authoritative Department opening" to introduce the relevant situation of steadily promoting the high-quality development of water conservancy in the new stage and comprehensively enhancing the national water security guarantee capacity.

Li Guoying, Minister of Water Resources, said that in recent years, the water resources department has implemented the new development concept of innovation, coordination, green, open and sharing, actively promoted the comprehensive and systematic management of river basins, accelerated the recovery of the ecological environment of rivers and lakes, and maintained the healthy life of rivers and lakes.

First, we will step up efforts to restore rivers that are cut off and lakes that have shrunk and dried up. China has organized and implemented ecological water replenishment for rivers and lakes in North China and the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal. In 2022, the scope of water replenishment covers 48 rivers and lakes in seven river systems in the Haihe River Basin, with a total ecological water replenishment of about 7 billion cubic meters. Most rivers in North China have flowing and clean water, and more and more rivers have come back to life and their basins have come back to life. The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal has been connected for the first time in a century. We have launched a recovery campaign for 88 mother rivers, formulated the "one river, one policy" and "one lake, one policy" operation plans, optimized the allocation of water resources, restored connectivity between rivers and lakes, and restored damaged ecosystems.

Second, we will ensure the ecological flow of rivers and lakes. The ecological flow targets of 171 key inter-provincial rivers and lakes and 415 intra-provincial rivers and lakes were determined, and the ecological flow targets were implemented by adopting measures such as unified water resource management in river basins, strict control of total water intake, strengthening dynamic monitoring and early warning, and strict supervision and assessment. By 2022, the ecological discharge rate of key rivers and lakes in the country has exceeded 90 percent, and more than 41,000 small hydropower stations in the country have basically reached the standard of "full drainage and full testing", playing an important role in restoring river connectivity and reviving the ecological environment of rivers and lakes.

Third, we will strengthen river and lake management and protection. We will strengthen the responsibility system of river chiefs and lake chiefs, define 300,000 river and lake chiefs at the provincial, city, county and township levels, and 900,000 at the village level. We will establish a mechanism for joint meetings of river and lake chiefs at the provincial level of the seven major river basins, strengthen unified planning, management, operation, and management of river basins, and build a coordinated pattern of river and lake management and protection for upstream and downstream rivers, left and right banks, and main and tributaries. We will strictly control the shoreline space of rivers and lakes, standardize the management of sand mining in rivers and lakes, make full use of satellite remote sensing, unmanned aerial vehicles and other technical means, strengthen daily supervision and inspection management and protection of rivers and lakes, and constantly improve the quality and effectiveness of river and lake supervision. By 2022, 29,000 problems such as indiscriminate occupation, mining, piling and construction of rivers and lakes will be rectified, and the flood storage capacity of rivers and lakes will be improved, and the appearance of rivers and lakes will continue to improve.

Fourth, we will speed up the control of groundwater overexploitation. We will speed up the determination of dual control indicators for the total amount of groundwater drawn and the level of groundwater, and strictly control the intensity of groundwater exploitation. Measures such as "saving, replacing, controlling, supplementing and managing" have been taken to continuously promote the comprehensive treatment of groundwater overexploitation in North China, improve the groundwater change notification mechanism, and strengthen groundwater supervision. In 2022, groundwater extraction in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region was reduced by about 4 billion cubic meters compared with 2018, groundwater overextraction was reduced by 2.6 billion cubic meters, and the proportion of groundwater supply dropped from 51 percent in 2018 to 35 percent, and the groundwater level in the region under control achieved an overall recovery.

Fifth, we will promote comprehensive soil erosion control in a scientific manner. By strengthening soil erosion prevention and protection, strictly regulating man-made soil erosion in accordance with the law, and accelerating key soil erosion control measures, we will continue to improve the situation of soil erosion across the country, and steadily improve the quality and stability of the ecosystem. In 2022, the area of soil erosion in China dropped to 2.6534 million square kilometers, down 83,500 square kilometers from 2018.

In the next step, the Ministry of Water Resources will continue to implement key tasks such as Mother River recovery, river and lake ecological protection and restoration, comprehensive control of groundwater overexploitation, and comprehensive control of soil and water loss, so as to maintain the healthy life of rivers and lakes, and strive to realize the sustainable utilization of river and lake functions.

From: CCTV news client