Managing Flood Risk: Practices in China
Dr. PENG Jing
Vice President, IWHR
Chair, WFEO-CEIT
Contents
General Situation of Flood Disasters
System for Flood Control and Disaster Relief
Flood Risk Management
Concluding Remarks
1. General Situation of Flood Disasters
3
⚫ A country prone to flood disasters.
⚫ In 2,155 years (206 BC to 1949) 1,092 severe floods.
⚫ At present, one of the most devastating natural
disasters.
Yangtze River Flood in 1998Catastrophic flash flood and
debris flow disaster in Zhouquin 2010
Landslide-dammed lake in Jinsha River in 2018
Rainstorm-triggered waterlogging in Haikou
in 2018
Yangtze-Huaihe Rivers Floods
in 1931Hankou street flooded in 1935
■ Threatened by serious floods: 1.1 million km2
■ Threatened & affected by flash floods: 3.86 million km2
1.1 features - Wide Influence
2/3
90%
Territorial area affected
by floods/flash floods to different degrees
Population affected
by floods to different degrees
0 50 100 150 200 250 300
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
Flooded cities
Counties (cities and districts) suffering flood disasters
受洪涝灾害县(市、区) 受淹/内涝城市
1.2 features - High Frequency of Occurrence
165 2094
2,094 (73%) counties
affected by flood
165 (25%) cities
suffering from floods/waterlogging
citiesCounties
on average per year
1.3 features – Diverse in Type
Flash floodsIn mountainous areas
Urban waterlogging/
pluvial floods
River-ice floodsin north China
Storm surges
River floodsIn plain area of lowland
1.4 features – Direct Economic Losses
239.00
779.08
412.77
641.74
1796.60 1653.30
2208.36
930.11
2550.90
930.23
711.63 623.03
838.00
1300.51
713.51
1662.20
1332.62
1123.30
955.44 845.96
3745.43
1301.27
2675.32
3155.74
1573.55
1660.75
3643.26
2142.53
1.37
3.98
1.72
2.05
4.10
2.86
3.26
1.24
3.21
1.13
0.80 0.65
0.82
1.11
0.52
0.91
0.64 0.46
0.32 0.25
0.94
0.28
0.57 0.55
0.25 0.25
0.49
0.26 0
1
2
3
4
5
6
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
3000
3500
4000
1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Pe
rcen
tage
of flo
od
-ind
uced
dire
ct e
co
no
mic
losse
s in
GD
P o
f th
e y
ea
r (%)
Year
洪涝灾害直接经济总损失 洪涝灾害直接经济总损失占当年GDP的比值Flood-induced direct
economic losses
Flo
od
-ind
uced d
irect e
co
no
mic
losse
s
(10
0 m
illion
yu
an
)
Percentage of flood-induced direct
economic losses in GDP of the yearDirect economic losses are still on the rise
Percentage of flood-induced direct economic losses down.
2. System for Flood Control and Disaster Relief
System of
engineering
measures
System
non-engineering
measures
Reservoirs Levees
Flood detention basins
Culvert gates
Laws & regulations
Organizations4 levels
Monitoring and early warning
Emergency supplies and
rescuers
Sci-Tech support
Good for main rivers + on-going for small-size rivers + flash flood
3.1 Flood mapping (1st stage: for key areas)
• 496,000 km2
• 55,900 maps
Since 2013, investment 1.5bn RMB
227
45
78
198
26
保护区
城市
蓄滞洪区
中小河流
洪泛区Flooded plains
Small and medium-
sized rivers
Flood detention basins
Cities
protected areas
3. Flood risk management
Yangtze River Basin Flood Scenario (case in 1954 )Flooding Process of Sankeshu Breach of Huangguang Levee
3.2 National Project on Flash Flood Disaster Prevention
Rain gauges
Alert systems
Management Systems at state, provincial and municipal level
Warning dissemination
Guiding evacuation
Monitoring +analyzing warning platform
54,000 automatic rain gauges;
20,000 automatic water stage gauges
Flash flood automatic monitoring and early warning system(set up in 2,076 counties)
In County-level
A total
investment of
30 billion yuan
since2010
(2013-2016)
29 provinces
300+ cities
2,000+ counties
Basic info. of rainstorm
characteristics for
530,000 small river
basins
Key prevention and control areas (1.2008 million km2)
Prevention and control areas (3.8561 million km2)
Capacity building: data base of flash flood evaluation in villages
3.3 Management planning supported by sci-tech
Revision of the plans
Emergency rescue
Compensation for flood detention basins
Flood damage assessment
Flood evacuation
Public awareness of flood risks
Plan design
Municipal gov’t
Catastrophe fund
Reserve fund
Co-insurance
Capital market
Reinsurance
risk
diversification
A B … Z
Gov’t
Support
Market
Operation
exceeding limits on claims
Counties
CCTV releasees to public the flash flood meteorological early-warning information
(Since 2015 )
10 pm July 22
Zhenbeibu Town, Xixia District, Yinchuan, Ningxia
24-hour rainfall forecast: 74mm
1-hour actual rainfall: around 39mm
Blue alert threshold: 32mm
Number of missing people: 1
Flash flood weather forecast
Higher
probabilityHigh
probability
Flash flood weather forecast analysis
1 am July 23
Laochi Village, Langjiazui Reservoir and Shuifu Village of
Shuifu Town, Gaolan County, Lanzhou, Gansu
24-hour rainfall forecast: 10mm
6-hour actual rainfall: around 22mm
Blue alert threshold:29mm
Death toll: 3
8 pm July 22 – 8 pm July 23Flash flood weather forecast
22 July 2018
Illustration
Precipitation forecast
No rain
Light rain
Moderate rain
Heavy rain
Rainstorm
Torrential rain
Flash flood warning
Very high probability
High probability
Probability
Possibility Disaster site
3.4 Public Awareness-Raising
3.5 Achievements in Flood Risk Management
3589
5113
3012
3499
5340
3852
5840
2799
4150
1896 1942
16051819
1551
1282
1660
2276
1230
633 538
3222
519673
775
486319
686
316187
0
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
De
ath
toll (n
um
ber o
f peo
ple
)
Year
3909
1614
495
Down by 2,295 on average each year
Down by 1,119 on average each year
11.5 Significantly reduce the
number of deaths and the
number of people affected
by water-related disaster
In terms of death toll, in past 3 decades
Speedy Urbanization new media era
Rapid economic developmentGlobal climate change
4.1 Challenges
Changing environment
Rising flood
risk
4. Concluding Remarks
11.5 Significantly reduce the number of deaths and the number of
people affected + substantially decrease the direct economic
losses caused by disasters, including water-related disasters, +
focus on protecting the poor and people in vulnerable situations.
13.1 Strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related
hazards and natural disasters in all countries.
13.3 Improve education, awareness-raising + human and
institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaptation,
impact reduction and early warning.
4.2 Way to go for sustainable development
Strengthen engineering measures01 Speed up hi-tech applications02
Enhance public participationand education
03 Improve laws and regulations04
International Exchange and Cooperation
4.3 Further to do
Thank You!