The ponds are filled with gently swaying water lilies while the mountains are covered by green vegetations. No one here recognizes that it’s Changting, an area that suffered severe water and soil erosion a few years ago. Over the past 30 years, Changting county has been working to bring water and soil erosion under control, and facilitating ecological civilization construction.

Blooming water lilies in Ting River National Wetland Park.[Photo by Hu Meidong/chinadaily.com.cn]

Black ducks play in the water of Ting River National Wetland Park.[Photo by Hu Meidong/chinadaily.com.cn]

The work has thoroughly rebuilt Changting from a wasteland into an ideal area with beautiful mountains and water landscapes, as well as realizing leap-forward development. However, people living in Changting are not satisfied with what they have achieved.

Xi Jinping made two important instructions on ecological construction against water and soil erosion in Changting at the 18th CPC National Congress and the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee held in 2012.

They required the central government as well as departments of different levels at the provincial and municipal level to strengthen support to control soil and water erosion and ecological civilization construction in Changting, speed up the transition from a waste mountain to an oasis and ecological homeland, carry out in-depth reform, accelerate poverty alleviation and development progress, and create a set of systematic and scientific control ideas.

Based on the situation of water and soil erosion control and ecological civilization construction work in Changting, the Party committee and government of Changting county proposed a plan to build the Ting River Economic and Ecological Corridor, which sets the Ting River as main line and the concept of “one river and two banks” as a standard in 2013.

The county will strive to build six functional areas of the Ting River Economic and Ecological Corridor from upstream to downstream, which include a nature conservation and ecological sightseeing area from Anjie to Xinqiao, an ecologically livable city area from Datong to Tingzhou, and a historical and cultural city protection area.