Canal restoration a boon to environment
Huai’an in East China’s Jiangsu province is advancing ecological restoration and strengthening the long-term management and protection of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal as part of its efforts to promote the canal’s sustainable development.
In the city’s Huai’an district, three automatic water quality monitoring stations have been set up along the Liyunhe Canal, part of the Huai’an section of the Grand Canal, to collect realtime water quality data. The data is needed to ensure water safety and security in the city and for the eastern route of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project that shares the same route as the Grand Canal and runs through the city, said local officials.
The district’s water quality has been enhanced thanks to such efforts. Official data showed that the combined proportion of water sections with good-quality surface water reaching Grade III or above hit 91.67%, without any bad-quality surface water below Grade V.
Meanwhile, Huai’an has implemented China’s water resource management system, which assigns government officials to take charge of rivers and lakes. The local government has assigned “river and lake chiefs” to manage waterway sections. They work together with grassroots chiefs to take targeted measures to improve the ecological management of the canal.
According to the city government, Huai’an has invested a total of 150 million yuan ($23.55 million) in the ecological restoration of major rivers and lakes, including the BeijingHangzhou Grand Canal, the
Hongze Lake and the ancient Huaihe River to promote the overall environmental protection and ecological conservation of the canal.
Efforts have also been made to boost urban greening along the shipping channel. So far, the urban green infrastructure has extended to cover a total area of 10.46 million square feet, consisting of squares, avenues and landscaping projects.
Another way of bringing out the best in the canal is to integrate the shipping channel with leisure facilities and tourism spots.
During last year’s seven-day National Day holiday in October, a total of 527,000 trips were made to Hongze district of Huai’an, where tourists experienced the canal-themed cultural tourism and ecotourism around the Hongze Lake.