Flood Control Project Construction Since Last Year

by

Mr. Zhang Jiyao, Vice Minister of Water Resources

November 9, 1999

In 1998, extraordinary floods occurred in the Yangtze and Songhuajiang River Basins. After the floods, the Chinese government increased financial input in flood control project construction on a large scale. The flood control project construction with emphasis on dyke enforcement produced obvious results. The flood control project with the focus on the Yangtze River played a significant role in this year's flood control efforts.

I. The Chinese government has increased investment in flood control project construction since last year.

From 1998 to the period before this year's flood season, a total investment of 46.466 billion Yuan has been channeled to water conservancy projects by the Central Government with the emphasis on regulation of large rivers and lakes, rehabilitation of risky reservoirs, flood control in major cities and reconstruction of damaged projects on the Yangtze and Songhuajiang Rivers in 1998 floods. Out of the total investment, 40.9 billion Yuan is for flood control projects, and 24.665 billion Yuan for large river embankment reinforcement and river course regulation, accounting for 53% of the total allocated amount. From 1998 to the end of July 1999, a total volume of 636 million cubic meters of earth, 33.03 million cubic meters of rock and 7.62 million cubic meters of concrete have been used, with a total of 6,084km of embankment cross-section improved to reach designed standards, 1,252km of embankment foundation treated and reinforced, 1,609km of unstable embankment treated, 1,528km of slopes protected, 1,885km of structures crossing dyke strengthened, 1,762km of dyke roads built, and more than 430,000 dangerous zones treated.

From 1998 to the period before this year's flood season, the Central Government allocated 7.79 billion Yuan for embankment construction in the Yangtze River Basin, with 216 million m3 of earth work and 2,2 million m3of concrete work completed, 340km of embankment cross-section improved to meet design standards, 120km of river embankment foundation seepage controlled, 1,249km of dangerous sections, unstable embankment and slopes protected, about 2,600 dangerous zones treated. The embankment relying on sub-dykes, damaged and collapsed sections in the 1998 flood have been strengthened.

II. The flood control project construction during last winter and this spring played a significant role in the flood control efforts in the Yangtze River and Taihu Lake Basins, and generated obvious benefits.

This year, the main stream of the Yangtze River, Dongting Lake and Poyang Lake witnessed the second highest water level after that of 1998 since 1954. At Jianli Hydrological Station, the highest water level was only 0.01m lower than in 1998. However, thanks to large scale of bank reinforcement and rehabilitation of damaged projects in the middle and down stream of the Yangtze River, compared with 1998, the dangerous situations reduced by 7,750 or 82%, severe dangers reduced by 587, or 84%, among which, piping and foundation break decreased by 1,737 and 296 respectively, or 86% and 90%. In 1998, 600km of sub-banks were built along the Yangtze River, with water-retaining sub-banks amounting to 300 km. In 1999 the figure was 60km with only 10km of water-retaining sub-banks built mainly in crossroads, and cross-bank structures. In 1998 flood, 6 main dyke sections in midstream and downstream of the Yangtze River collapsed such as Paizhouwan, Mengxi and Anzao etc.So did the main embankment in Jiujiang City. In 1999 only one dyke section called Mingzu in Dongting Lake collapsed, and the number of inundated dykes was much less than in 1998.

After the 1998 Flood, the Central Government developed a strategy of "leveling protective embankment to divert water, retreating the land to lakes, and building township for relocated people". During this year's flood season, a total of 337 protective embankments were used to divert and retain water in Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi and Anhui Provinces, with an increase of 2.35 billion cubic meters of storage water, which effectively lowered the water level.

The water conservancy projects constructed during last winter and this spring not only successfully reduced danger but also substantially decreased the input for disaster relief during flood control in the Yangtze River Basin under the condition of same scale of floods. This year, 3.77 million people were mobilized in risk rescue in the mainstream and tributaries of the Yangtze River and districts around Dongting Lake and Poyang Lake, which is only half of the figure of last year. The number of PLA soldiers and policemen involved is 1/18 of last year, material consumed in risk rescue is 1/2 to 1/6 of last year. In face of the large floods, except strengthened observation and local risk rescue, the people's life and production were in good order.

This year, a serious flood occurred in the Taihu Lake Basin, with the maximum water level reaching 5.08m, 0.29m higher than the record level in 1991. Integrated harnessing projects in Taihu Lake basin played an important role. 4.8 billion cubic meters of water was drained by the Taipu River Project, Wangyu River Project and South Diversion Project in Hangzhou, Jiaxing and Huzhou areas, which effectively relieved flood pressure on the basin. 1 billion cubic meters of water was retained by around-lake banks, which assured security along the Lake. According to statistics, so far 4.6 billion Yuan has been input in Taihu Lake Harnessing Projects, and this year 9.2 billion Yuan of disaster losses has been saved by this project.

III. Characteristics of flood control project construction since last year.

The construction of flood control projects in the past year has the following characteristics:

1. The governments at all levels have put much emphasis on flood control project construction;

2. The Ministry of Water Resources has timely established and optimized regulations to strengthen flood control project construction and technical standards for project design, construction, quality evaluation and test approval;

3. The systems of tendering and bidding, project supervision and contract management have been adopted and standardized among newly constructed projects;

4. An integrated quality management system has been promoted with the legal person's responsibility, the supervision unit's control, the contractor's obligations, and the government's supervision combined;

5. Local governments increasingly strengthen the management of water conservancy funds, establish and improve financial management regulations to promote the benefits of funds;

6. Increasing the contents of science and technology by promoting the use of new technology, new material, new techniques in flood control construction;

7. Strengthening supervision of project quality, plan implementation and fund use.

However, water projects in China still have such problems as low standards for flood control systems, poor anti-seepage capacity of embankments, and many potential risks. There is still a long way to go. With regard to flood control construction management, there are following main problems:

1. The planning, design and approval work can not satisfy the need of large -scale flood control project construction. Few projects do not abide by the planning requirement and construction standards. The design institutes do not have required qualification and the design quality is poor;

2. Many projects lack a sound system of authorized legal person responsibility, and have obscure construction responsibility and rights;Some projects do not go through standard bidding procedures;

3. The percentage of construction supervision is low;

5. Some projects were not designed or constructed according to technical standards, with potential quality problems;

6. For some projects, the project funds are not managed strictly and problems with misuse and retaining of funds exist.

IV. Further Strengthening supervision and control to improve water conservancy construction.

President Jiang Zemin and Premier Zhu Rongji inspected the Yellow River and Yangtze River respectively this year and made important instructions. The focus of dyke construction this winter and next spring will be the increase of height and thickness of some low dykes, seepage prevention of foundation, surface protection of dykes on the sections of flow-ward side and against-flow side, slump banks harassment, strengthening and removal of danger for the bank-crossing structures and risky reservoirs. The construction will be in stages and in the order of importance and urgency according to the importance of the dykes. The central funds will be mainly allocated to the construction of key dykes of big rivers and lakes. The local funds will be used for the construction of dykes in the main tributaries and the central government will give certain subsidies.

For the next stage construction of flood control projects, seven major tasks must be carefully fulfilled:

  1. To strengthen the management of reconnaissance and design to secure the quality of design. Qualifications of those design institutes must be strictly inspected. The Ministry of Water Resources has already checked the first class and second class qualified design institutes for dyke project reconnaissance and design and will publish the results on ¡°China Water Resources News¡± for supervision by the society. The unannounced design institutes cannot be engaged in design for relevant water project construction.
  2. To clearly divide the boundary of construction and management and to realize the project legal person responsible system. The responsible entities should be ascertained for the project. For projects invested by the central government mainly or projects covering more than one province, municipality or autonomous region, the Ministry of Water Resources or authorized River Basin Commissions shall be responsible for the formation of project legal entities and designation of the representatives of these legal entities. For projects carried out by the province, municipality or autonomous region, its government shall be responsible for the formation of legal entities of those projects and designation of the representatives of these legal entities. The legal entity is the responsible body in charge of the whole process of project construction.
  3. To consolidate supervision management of project construction and responsibility of supervisors. Qualifications of those construction supervision institutions must strictly inspected. In order to access supervision of the society, the first class and second class qualified construction supervision institutes for dyke projects will be published on ¡°China Water Resources News¡±.
  4. Qualification of construction enterprises should be strictly controlled and tendering and bidding system should be implemented. The inspection of qualifications of constructors must be toughened and grading of the constructors should be strictly controlled. Unqualified and low-standard constructors must be forbidden to undertake the construction that beyond their qualifications. Tending and bidding must follow the recently issued Law on Tendering and Bidding.
  5. Management of funds must be strictly controlled and allocation of counterpart funds must be ensured. Diversion of construction funds for water conservancy construction, possess and peculation of public funds or misuse of funds must be stopped from the very beginning.
  6. To establish a responsibility system for check and acceptance of construction. 'Five No Acceptance' should be implemented firmly, i.e. unqualified constructions below standards are not accepted; counterpart funds unallocated fully are not accepted; projects with unqualified recordings of files are not accepted; with unclear management institutions are not accepted; and those with non-standardized construction procedures are not accepted.
  7. To strengthen supervision, check and execution of actions of breaking law and regulation. The Ministry of Water Resources should establish a check system for the construction of water projects, on the basis of making inspection tours for the projects. A specific check institute should be formed for consolidating the inspection and supervision of quality, funds, planning of infrastructure construction on water conservancy. The telephone accusation for the quality of constructions and inspections for the cases should be continued and well undertaken and give response for each case. It is welcomed that the accusation and exposure of quality problems of construction will be from the whole society, as well as press and media.

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