The topic of primary interest this year was the Loess Plateau, a 500,000 km 2 area along the Yellow River in north-central China. Erosion results in soil loss and sedimentation of rivers and puts downstream plains at risk for flooding in high rainfall years. The area also benefits from poverty alleviation programs from Chinese and international sources. These programs are essentially rural agricultural development. Much of the land development effort seems to try to defy nature and physics.
Research programs appear to be conservative and academic.
They tend to focus on refining relationships already well understood, rather than resting unconventional soil and crop management technologies that have proven useful elsewhere. Population pressure is another factor, as China's population is expected to increase by 300 million people before it peaks. The petrol-chemistry, metallurgy, chemistry, light industry and ship industries are the five sectors chosen to carry out the demonstration project. The three-year project is divided into two phases. The State Environmental Protection Administration has recently issued the Standards for the Control of Harmful Substances in Automobile Petrol.