To solve the problem of groundwater overdraft, since 1985, the Provincial Department of Water Resources started to popularise the rational irrigation system and the techniques of pipe water supply and border irrigation. Another technique of irrigation with mixed saline water and fresh water was popularised after 1998.
In 2002, the Ministry of Water Resources began to set up some pilot water-saving districts. The provincial government selected the Taocheng District as one of the provincial pilots, and worked out an implementation plan together with the local government and local water resources bureau. The plan including setting up a water management mechanism of government regulation, a market guidance and public participation, and the water resources bureau of the district conducting the macro regulation and control and unified management of water resources.
After the founding of the farmers Water User Associations, the main tasks of the local government and the water resources bureau are:
- To strictly control the overdraft of deep groundwater;
- To implement the water saving self-management mode, including controlling the total quantity and quota of water use, measuring each family’s water use, rewarding water saving and penalising over-users, carrying out self-governance of the association, and increasing marketing motivation and public participation;
- To guide the farmers and other water users to make self-management;
- To cultivate a water-valued, water-protected and water-saving environment;
- To construct a water-saving and pollution prevention society.
Furthermore, it also included farmer water user associations (WUAs) for the democratic water resources management for the allocated water; applying measures of total quantity control and quota management, as well as measuring water use at each family and encouraging water-saving users while penalising over-users.