Industry News

BEIJING, Oct. 22 (Xinhua) -- Along the Yangtze River in Yichang, central China's Hubei Province, steel frames that once supported sand-and-gravel conveyors now hold swings, while a former industrial building has been transformed into an art gallery.

The structures stand in Lighthouse Square, a riverside public space created on the site of a former port, where phosphate ore, sand and gravel were once loaded and unloaded.

Chen Yuanyuan, a local resident who now volunteers to patrol the riverbank, recalls when dust was so thick that residents kept their windows closed. Today, the restored waterfront has become a popular spot for daily walks and environmental education.

Since 2018, Yichang's riverbank restoration project has removed 15 docks, relocated 35 enterprises and 113 households, restored vegetation across 87 hectares and rehabilitated eight kilometers of Yangtze River shoreline.

Along the Yangtze River, shoreline restoration is accompanied by broader efforts to improve water quality, control pollution and restore aquatic habitats across the basin.

FROM LOCAL RESTORATION TO BASIN-WIDE GOVERNANCE

China's efforts to protect the Yangtze River have improved water quality and supported the recovery of native species, although restoring a healthy river ecosystem will require a substantially longer period of time.

The Ministry of Ecology and Environment rated the Yangtze River basin's water quality as excellent in the first quarter of 2026. Across the wider Yangtze River Economic Belt, the proportion of monitored sections meeting Grade I to III water quality standards has risen from 67 percent in 2015 to 96.5 percent.

Habitat restoration has helped create conditions for the recovery of endangered species. In April 2025, researchers recorded natural spawning and successful hatching of Yangtze sturgeon in a restored spawning ground in the Chishui River, a tributary of the upper Yangtze River.

Researchers released 20 adult sturgeon into a restored habitat of about 8,000 square meters, where a natural spawning ground had been created. The species had not reproduced naturally since the early 2000s and was declared extinct in the wild by the International Union for Conservation of Nature in 2022. The recent successful spawning and hatching mark an important step toward rebuilding a wild population.

In 2018, the southwestern Chinese provinces of Yunnan, Guizhou and Sichuan established a water environment compensation fund for the Chishui River basin, creating the first cross-provincial ecological compensation mechanism in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.

The three provinces jointly contributed 200 million yuan (about 30 million U.S. dollars) under the initial agreement, with compensation allocations linked to water quality at designated monitoring sections. A second-round agreement signed in 2023 increased annual funding to 300 million yuan for the 2021-2025 period.

In the Yunnan section of the Chishui River, water quality at the exit monitoring section had remained at Grade II for five consecutive years as of the end of 2024, while the number of recorded fish species in the section had risen from 36 in early 2020 to 43.

At the basin level, the Yangtze River Protection Law, which took effect in March 2021, provides a legal framework for ecological conservation, pollution control and resource management. Under the river chief system, officials at different levels are responsible for waterway protection, with mechanisms in place to clarify responsibilities across administrative boundaries and coordinate action among upstream and downstream areas.

According to Li Xiaokai, senior water resources management specialist at the World Bank, China's approach to Yangtze River governance features integrated management of the basin as an ecological and economic system, coordination across government levels and sectors, and the integration of ecological protection with economic development.

The World Bank-supported Yangtze River Protection and Ecological Restoration Programs, which cover three provinces in the middle reaches of the river basin, place institutional development at their core, recognizing that sustainable outcomes depend as much on governance systems as on infrastructure investments, said Li.

LESSONS FOR REGIONAL COOPERATION

Despite differences in geography and development contexts, China and many countries across the Asia-Pacific face similar challenges in river governance and ecological protection, Li said. One major challenge is institutional fragmentation.

River basins rarely conform to political boundaries, and responsibilities for water resources, environmental protection, agriculture, energy, transport and land management are often divided among multiple agencies. Decisions made in one sector or jurisdiction can therefore have unintended consequences elsewhere in the basin, said Li.

In the Lancang-Mekong basin, China has provided year-round hydrological information from two upstream stations to the Mekong River Commission (MRC) since November 2020, supporting river monitoring and upstream-downstream coordination on flood and drought risks. The country has proposed further cooperation on urgent notifications, wider data sharing across the basin, and joint work on flood forecasting and drought response to strengthen upstream-downstream coordination in addressing flood and drought risks.

Sun Jingrui, an associate professor at Yunnan University, said the Yangtze River governance experience shows that fish recovery depends on a governance system capable of sustaining the costs of conservation, rather than on fishing restrictions alone.

Fish protection must be treated as both an ecological issue and a matter of food systems and livelihoods, Sun said. Measures to reduce fishing need to be accompanied by alternative sources of income and food, vocational training and social security for affected communities.

This is particularly important in the Lancang-Mekong basin, where fish resources are closely linked to food security and community culture, especially in downstream countries. Differences in countries' enforcement capacity, development priorities and dependence on fisheries mean that a uniform, long-term fishing ban across the entire basin would be difficult to implement, Sun said.

Fish recovery also requires restoring river connectivity and protecting the habitats needed for fish to complete their life cycles. A paper co-authored by Sun found more than 10,000 small river barriers in the lower Mekong, disrupting connectivity along fish migration routes.

Sun suggested introducing seasonal or area-specific fishing restrictions during key migration and breeding periods, prohibiting destructive fishing methods, improving fish passage around barriers and adjusting dam and sluice operations where feasible. Protecting key habitats, including spawning grounds, deep pools and floodplain nursery areas, is another priority, Sun said.

"Truly sustainable conservation must give affected people the means to make the transition with dignity," said Sun.