From June 26 to 27, National Development and Reform Commission and China Meteorological Administration (CMA) convened a meeting on weather modification work. It is reported that China has boasted large-scale and effective weather modification operational strength with a complete system. It has scored remarkable results in terms of serving agricultural production, supporting disaster preparedness, promoting ecological civilization construction, and safeguarding forest and grassland fire prevention and extinction, and so forth.

During the meeting Photoed by LI Gen

Since the 13th Five-Year Plan, the management mechanism and working mechanism of weather modification work in China is being gradually improved, with enormously boosted fundamental operational capacity, constantly strengthened scientific innovation and talent support capabilities, more independently developed key technologies and equipment, and increasingly stronger service supporting ability, etc.

In terms of helping agricultural bumper harvest, geared to key farming seasons and the critical period of crop water demand, artificial rain (snow) and hail prevention operations were carried out in a timely manner in various localities. In Northeast China, thanks to regional weather modification capacity building in recent years, the average annual rainfall (snow) in the region increased by 27%, and the average annual grain output witnessed a jump by 23.2 billion jin.

As regards serving disaster preparedness, meteorological departments have worked together to carry out weather modification operations in response to drought, abnormally high temperatures, forest and grassland fire hazards and other natural disasters, helping to bring "timely rain" and "life-saving water" on many occasions.

In terms of helping build a beautiful China, ecological restoration weather modification operations have covered nearly three-quarters of key national ecological functional areas such as Sanjiangyuan and Qilian Mountains, and nearly half of large and medium-sized reservoirs, for instance, Danjiangkou Reservoir. Satellite remote sensing monitoring results show that since the 13th Five-Year Plan, the vegetation coverage in the Sanjiangyuan area has gradually increased; the water area of Qinghai Lake has increased by 371 square kilometers; and the desertification land area in the Qilian Mountain area has continued to drop off.

The meeting also carried out discussions over topics like weather modification capacity building, cross-department exchange and coordination, and information sharing mechanism construction.

Editor：Liu Shuqiao