WATER RESOURCES MANAGEMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION IN NORTHERN CHINA

摘要

The shortage of water resources and fragile ecology characterize in the Hexi Corridor, which is one of arid inland regions. Conventional management is composed of a predatory approach of reclamation, irrigation, cultivation, salinization, abandonment, desertification. An ecological view was used to analyze the problems existing with respect to the effects on the environment of the management and exploitation of the water resources in Shiyanghe watershed. The action was taken to save Minqin Oasis. The strategies used includes: developing water-saving agriculture; promoting the coefficient of water resources usage; restricting groundwater exploitation; saving soil water by using the technique of straw-mulched storage irrigation; enhancing public awareness of ecology, resources and water-saving to develop sustainable desert oasis. By using Shiyanghe watershed as a case study, the paper discussed the problems with respect to the impacts of large scale exploitation of water resources on ecology and environment in arid and semiarid desert oasis area. Suggestions were made to solve these problems.