Flood Disaster Reduction in China's Major Cereal Production Areas

Northeast China (hereinafter referred to as NEC), the river basins of Huanghhe (the Yellow River), Huaihe and Haihe (hereinafter shortened to RBHHH) and the middle & lower reaches of the Yangtze River (hereinafter referred to as MLRYR) are the three major areas for agricultural and cereal production in China, advantageous in natural resources and tremendously potential for agricultural development. In 1996, the cereal yield and agricultural output of the areas accounted for 66% and 63.7% respectively of their national total. In the meantime, the three areas are places where flood disasters occur most frequently, extensively and disastrously. The economic loss caused by flood disasters to the areas occupies more than 60% of the national total on average. Flooding, waterlog, inundation, drought and salinity have resulted in the massive medium and low yield fields of the areas, including over 20 billion hectares of unmanaged or poorly managed low yield saline land that is low lying and prone to waterlog. Suppose the fields are well managed, an increase of at least 50 million tons of cereal yield can be expected, taking up 56.8% of the total cereal increase of these areas. Besides, disaster caused reduction in cereal yield can be avoided or weakened. From this perspective, flood disaster prevention & reduction in the major cereal production areas is a very important factor for the sustained growth of cereal production in China in the 21 st century.