China's National Water Network (NWN)
1.Introduction. Wang Jianhua, Vice President of China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, stated that the water network, transportation network, energy network and information network are listed as the four basic networks of modern Chinese society.i The 13th Five-Year Plan of China introduced major changes in China’s water administration system. Further, the 14th Five-Year Plan and Outline of Vision 2035 proposed major strategies for implementing NWN.ii The aim of this paper is to study the contours of China’s National Water Network.
2.National Water Conservancy Work Conference 2022. On 05 January 2022, China in National Water Conservancy Work Conference has announced policies to further NWN as part of efforts to improve the capability to safeguard water security.iii China’s Ministry of Water Resources issued the Guiding Opinions on the Implementation of Major NWN Projects. The General Office of the Ministry of Water Resources issued the “Implementation Plan for the Implementation of Major NWN Project under the China’s 14th Five-Year Plan”.iv It gives out the main goals of accelerating the construction of major NWN projects, focus on improving the optimal allocation system for water resources and systematically deploying resources.
3.The Guiding Opinions highlight the requirement to build a number of NWN projects by 2025. Efforts will be made to complete the allocation of water resources, urban and rural water supply, flood control and drainage, water ecological protection and an intelligent water network.
4.The Guiding Opinions highlighted the five main tasks for the implementation of major NWN projects, which includes:
a)Scientific planning of the layout of the NWN and coordinated promotion of the formulation of four-level water network at national, provincial, municipal and county levels.
b)To promote the main framework of water network and build the outline of the NWN, including high-quality development of the follow-up projects of SNWDP and accelerating the implementation of other water diversion projects.
c)To improve the layout of regional water network and the rural water supply network. Strengthening existing large and medium irrigation areas including building of modern irrigation areas.
d)To strengthen the potential tapping, construction of key regulation and storage projects, accelerating the construction of key water source projects and strengthening the construction of strategic water reserves.
e) To strengthen project construction management, promoting intelligent construction of projects, enhancing scientific and technological support capabilities, improving level of operation scheduling and the operation management mechanism.
5. The Guiding Opinions also highlighted four safeguard measures, including strengthening organisational leadership, speeding up preliminary work, strengthening financial guarantees, carrying out supervision and assessment.
6.In line with the Guiding Opinions, the General Office of the Ministry of Water Resources issued the Implementation Plan to relevant departments and directly affiliated units. It further refined the tasks proposed in the Guiding Opinions into 59 specific measures and clarified the completion time frame to responsible units respectively.
7. a) By 2025, Chinas water supply capacity to increase by 29 billion cubic metres, with the water supply coverage rate of 88 percent in rural regions.vi
b) The irrigation and drainage engineering system in large and medium irrigation areas has been gradually improved and 15 million units 1 million hectares) of effective irrigation, areas will be created. The level of digitalisation, intelligence and refined dispatching will also be improved.vii
c) Accelerate the construction of water diversion projects such as in Zhenzhong Region from Central Yunnan, Hanjiang to Weihe River Project and Yangtze River to Huaihe River project, aswell as the construction of key water source such as Dongtaizi Reservoir in Inner Mongolia and Baile Reservoir in Fujian.viii
d) Accelerate the preliminary work of major water conservancy projects such as the allocation of water resources around the Beibu Gulf and the water diversion of the Xiongan Canal in Hebei.
e) Promote the construction of provincial water network. Strengthen important regional projects and opening up the last mile of the NWN.
f) Scientifically promote the development of the follow-up projects of the Eastern and Middle routes of the South to North Water Diversion Project SNWDP) and conduct an in-depth preliminary research of the Western route of the SNWDP.
g) Improve the flood control system in the basins and speed up the construction of defence lines against flood and drought disasters. Vigorously promoting the reinforcement of more than 100 large and medium-sized reservoirs and more than 3,400 small-scale reservoirs.
8. Achievements.
a) The construction of Eastern and Middle routes of the SNWDP have been completed and operationalised. SNWDP has transferred over 50 billion cubic metres of water and has benefitted over 140 million people.ix
b) In 2021, Chinas investment in water conservancy facilities has reached 757.6 billion yuan 118.88 billion USD).x 67 of the 150 major water conservancy projects have been approved and 62 projects have been started.xi
9. Assessment. The NWN is an important part of the national infrastructure which has been included in the 14th FYP outline to implement a number of major water diversion, water supply and irrigation, flood control, drought relief, disaster reduction and other projects to build a national water conservancy infrastructure.xii China has raised the issue of water governance from an issue of water security to an issue of national security. China has announced several policies to ensure NWN as part of efforts to improve the water security. The detailed documents for “Guiding opinions” as well as the “Implementation Plan” are not yet made public. However, the elements covered in the press release are indicative of the kind of attention and focus being given to accelerating the major water diversion projects and various follow up projects of the SNWDP. The NWN is a huge systematic and strategic project related to the long-term development of the China.
References
i https://www.sohu.com/a/467437449_162758/
ii https://hangxunbao.com/a/10012304.html
iii http://www.mwr.gov.cn/english/Medianews/202201/t20220114_1559561.html
iv http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2022-01/06/content_5666719.htm
v https://www.chinacourt.org/article/detail/2022/01/id/6472163.shtml
vi http://english.www.gov.cn/statecouncil/ministries/202201/04/content
vii vhttps://www.chinacourt.org/article/detail/2022/01/id/6472163.shtml
viii https://www.seetao.com/details/132826.html
ix https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-01-08/China-s-water-diversion-project-transfers-50b-cubic-meters-of-water-16E9jL6cfmg/index.html and https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-12-14/China-s-South-North-Water-Diversion-benefits-140-million-people-15Z46gCgJsA/index.html
x http://www.china.org.cn/china/2022-01/07/content_77974925.htm