Hu Angang: Exploring the way of water management in China

Water plays an important role in China's economic and social development and the construction of ecological civilization. It is not only related to flood control, water supply and food security, but also to economic, ecological and national security. Although China has created a miracle of economic growth over the past 30 years of reform and opening up, water problems in China are becoming more and more complex and prominent: frequent floods and droughts, prominent contradiction between supply and demand of water resources, deteriorating water environment, serious water ecological degradation, and even more serious water problems caused by climate change. It can be said that the water problem has become the bottleneck of China's economic and social development and the main weak link in the construction of ecological civilization. The water challenge has posed a major challenge to China's green development transition.

In history, great rivers and rivers were the birthplaces and cradles of various civilizations, large and small. One of the reasons why the Chinese civilization has not only been inherited, but also fostered the world's largest population is that water control has always been an important task of the Chinese nation to ensure the well-being of the people and rejuvenate the country. In ancient times, Yu the Great controlled the flood; in Han Dynasty, Emperor Wudi commanded to block the breach of the Yellow River; in Qing Dynasty, Kangxi took the Yellow River affairs and grain transport as the priority of administration; After the founding of New China, the material and human capital investment in flood control was strengthened. In China, success in controlling water means success in governing the country. This is true in the past, the present and the future.

Water problem appears to be a problem of resources and environment, but in essence it is a typical governance problem. If, in the face of numerous water problems, policies cannot be adjusted in time and institutional arrangements cannot be established to adapt to them, the trend of water resource shortage and water environment deterioration will not be curtailed. At present, China is facing several intertwined water problems, such as "more water, less water, dirty water and muddy water". The root cause of these problems is that under the new economic and social conditions, bad institutions and imperfect mechanisms have led to improper incentives and unreasonable resource allocation. This is called "poor governance". To deal with water problems, we need to keep pace with The Times, promote governance reform, reform and adjust governance mechanisms, and establish a new governance model of "good governance" to maximize public interests.

Chinese people like to use "Tao" to represent the truth behind everything in the universe. The exploration of the Tao of governance is actually the exploration of the universal law of governance. This kind of exploration should come from the practice, which is the observation and summary of the practical experience, and return to the practice, and the results should be used to guide the development of the practice. Such exploration can be divided into four levels: information, knowledge, theory and wisdom, from the outside to the inside and from the shallow to the deep. Information is the starting point of understanding things, information is screened and summarized, knowledge is obtained; Theory is obtained by systematic analysis and verification of knowledge. The further synthesis and sublimation of theory forms wisdom. Wisdom is the product of information, knowledge and theory accumulated to a certain extent. Therefore, based on China's governance practice, sorting out information, producing knowledge, creating theories and refining wisdom constitute a specific approach to explore the way of China's governance. The supreme wisdom of "Tao" needs to go through local "pilot", repeated "trial and error", continuous summary and practice test, then it can be gradually presented and become people's understanding and consensus. The exploration of the way of "good governance" needs to go through the repeated process of long-term practice, understanding and re-practice.

How to achieve "good governance" in water management is one of the biggest problems in China's governance. The Institute for Chinese Studies of Tsinghua University has been studying water governance for more than ten years. Our attention to China's water problems began when the Yellow River stopped flowing. The Yellow River flood has been famous in the world since ancient times. With the rapid growth of water consumption since the reform and opening up, the problem of water shortage has become increasingly prominent, and the Yellow River cut-off is a prominent manifestation of this contradiction. The lower reaches of the Yellow River began to be cut off in 1972, and in the 1990s, it was cut off every year. In 1997, the number of days without flow reached 226. In 1998, the interruption of the Yellow River became a major problem concerned by all circles of society.

As for the causes of the Yellow River's discontinuous flow, the Yellow River control workers emphasize the congenital shortage of water resources and the lack of engineering regulation and storage capacity; hydrology and water resources experts emphasize the reduction of rainfall and natural runoff; geologists emphasize the change of geological conditions at the source of the Yellow River; sediment experts emphasize the effect of soil and water conservation on reducing sediment; and economists emphasize the low water price and low water resource utilization efficiency. We put forward the theory of "system failure", which holds that although natural factors are an important reason for the Yellow River cut-off, it should not be exaggerated. The direct cause of the Yellow River cut-off is human factors, while the root cause is poor management and improper allocation of water resources in the basin, and the essence behind the cut-off phenomenon is the failure of water distribution system in the basin. Market failure, government failure and property right failure exist in the Yellow River water separation system.

Based on the above judgment, we propose that to deal with the imbalance and inefficiency of water resources allocation in the basin, we should redefine the relationship between the government and the market, and optimize the allocation of resources by introducing the water rights market. In order to establish the water rights market in the basin, the corresponding democratic consultation mechanism and benefit compensation mechanism are needed as guarantees. We suggest the active introduction of a "quasi-market" which is different from the traditional "directive allocation" and the "complete market". In other words, local governments, as representatives of water rights, form water markets in the upper and lower reaches of the basin through political democratic consultation. This new idea was gradually realized in the Yellow River basin management.

As a kind of natural resources with mixed characteristics and scarcity, the allocation of water resources is a kind of benefit distribution, which can not rely entirely on government allocation or market allocation, but needs a more complex mixed institutional arrangement. In the era of planned economy, the main goal of controlling the Yellow River was flood control and silt reduction, so it was effective to rely mainly on engineering technology. With the transformation of economy and society and the increase of water resources utilization, the management target of the Yellow River has increased water resources management and water environment protection, which is difficult to be solved only by engineering technology, and the existing system is facing failure. Policy adjustment is slow and system construction lags behind, which is the deep lesson that leads to the Yellow River shutdown. The crisis of the Yellow River cut-off is in essence a crisis of governance.

The interruption of the Yellow River is the epitome of China's water problem at the turn of the century. In the past decade, China has significantly accelerated the transformation of water governance and made a series of important progress in addressing complex water problems. It includes the change of the concept of water control, from intemperate demand from nature to harmonious coexistence between man and nature, from mutual exclusion and conflict between man and water to coexistence and harmony between man and water; The reform of the management system emphasizes the unified management of water resources and integrated management of river basins, and implements the strictest water resources management system; The innovation of water control means, the introduction of water rights, water market and other market means, modern information means, public participation and other diversified means. Remarkable progress has been made in the reform of water control methods, such as the interruption of the Yellow River.

The exploration of the reform of the way of water control in China conforms to the general cognitive law. From the initial understanding of water problem information, to the formation of systematic knowledge of water crisis, and then to explore innovative theories to cope with the water crisis, gradually accumulate and form the wisdom of water control in the new era. The new wisdom of water control in harmony between man and water conforms to the road of "harmony between nature and man" of Chinese civilization, and conforms to the trend of green development of the world and China with its practice of water control in the new era. The "Three red lines" of the strictest water resources regime (the red line for water development and utilization control, which aims to limit total water consumption to 700 billion cubic meters by 2030; Water use efficiency control red line, water use efficiency at or near the world's advanced level by 2030; By 2030, the total amount of major pollutants into rivers and lakes shall be controlled within the pollutant absorption capacity of water-function zones, and the water quality in water-function zones shall reach over 95 %. This is a water resource management theory with Chinese characteristics and a new water control measure guided by the concept of harmony between human and water. Water rights and water market theory is a new idea to guide the introduction of market mechanism in water resources management, which is helpful to improve the fairness and efficiency of water resources allocation. With the further development of water control practice, the information and knowledge on water control will continue to increase, and the theories and wisdom of water control will be more abundant.

(Source: From Chinese Journal of Social Sciences, Jun. 12, 2015)