The Beijing News:

The medium and large irrigated areas in China are the main battleground for ensuring national food security. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, China has redoubled its efforts to transform and build medium and large irrigated areas, consolidating the water conservancy foundation for food security. The No. 1 Central Document for 2022 also called for stepping up efforts to promote the follow-up construction of support facilities and transform medium and large irrigated areas, plan and newly build a number of modern irrigated areas in areas with appropriate water and soil resources, and give priority to turning medium and large irrigated areas into high-standard farmland. What progress and achievements have been made in the transformation and construction of medium and large irrigated areas? Thank you.

Chen Mingzhong:

Thank you for your question. China boasts a long history of irrigation. At present, China's effective irrigated farmland accounts for 54% of the country's arable land, and produces from the land account for over 75% of the country's grain and 90% of the country's cash crops. Irrigated areas are crucial to stabilizing high yields. The CPC Central Committee and the State Council have attached great importance to the development, construction and renovation of irrigated areas and have invested around 150 billion yuan since the 18th CPC National Congress in building and renovating irrigated areas. This has delivered remarkable results, and laid a solid foundation for irrigation work in securing China's food supply. The achievements can be summarized in the following aspects: 

First, we have established a network integrating projects for water storage, diversion, withdrawal, transportation and drainage. There are 7,330 medium- and large-sized irrigated areas each above 10,000 mu across China. We constructed a batch of canals and renovated a series of supporting facilities, water pumping stations, aqueducts and ditches. The length of major canals reached 400,000 kilometers, 10 times the Earth's circumference. The irrigated areas can water farmland in times of drought and drain water in times of flood. 

Second, we have promoted water conservation in agriculture with substantial improvements in the efficiency of irrigation water use. The national index for effective use of irrigation water increased from 0.516 in 2012 to 0.568 in 2021. The amount of water saved annually reached 48 billion cubic meters, 1.3 times the annual water supply of the Yellow River, or 10 times the amount of water in Miyun Reservoir. 

Third, we have increased and improved irrigated areas. We have restored or increased irrigated areas amounted by 60 million mu, and renovated about 300 million mu of irrigated areas, which prevented irrigated areas from declining. The area of effective irrigated farmland nationwide increased from 937 million mu in 2012 to 1,037 million mu. 

Fourth, we have increased comprehensive grain productivity. The newly added grain productivity amounted to 30 billion kilograms, with the average yield per mu of medium- and large-sized irrigated farmland areas increasing around 100 kilograms, 1.5 to 2 times the national average. 

Next, in collaboration with the national water network, major water diversion projects and programs to protect major water resources, the MWR plans to construct and renovate another batch of irrigated areas to increase China's comprehensive ability to produce grain and provide solid water conservancy support for securing national food security. Thank you.