The project of “Rehabilitation of degraded land ecosystems in the mountainous area of the Southern Shaanxi Province” was initiated in Wuhan on Mar. 26. The experts of China and Germany formally joined hands to implement water and soil conservation rehabilitation of the origin of Hanjiang River.

Qinba Mountainous Area in Shaanxi Province is the water source region of Middle Route of South-to-North Water Diversion Project, i.e. the origin of Hanjiang River. Due to the successive degradation of natural forest and unreasonable use of land, the natural disasters such as landslide and flood happen more frequent in the area, increasing rapidly from once per 28 years to once per 5 years, therefore, the water environment has been influenced to some extent.

The project  is undertaken jointly by the Soil and Water Conservation Department of Changjiang Scientific Research Institute (CRSRI) and the Institute of Silviculture of Technische Universitat München (TUM), Germany. The experts of China and Germany is planning to launch an investigation into the effects of afforestation and reasonable land use on water & soil loss mitigation and surface water quality improvement in the area from Mar. 27 to Mar. 29, on this basis, the “land use planning system” for eco-environmental management is to be advanced.

According to the introduction of project manager, the “land use planning system” is helpful for decision-making departments concerned to introduce integrative planning techniques, with the purpose of strengthening environmental landscape management through reducing soil erosion, improving surface water quality, and integrating ecological, economical and social.