After the 1998 flood of the Yangtze River, one of the worlds most important rivers, environmental experts realized that, to control flooding, much more attention must be paid to vegetation cover on bare lands, thin forest land, and shrub-covered land in mountain areas. In 1999, an environmental monitoring project of the forests in 11 provinces of the Yangtze River basin was undertaken. This book reports on soil loss prediction and the successful practices of soil loss control in eastern China in recent years.

Part I: General characteristics of the hilly region of middle and lower Yangtze River.- Ecological and environmental characteristics in the hilly region of middle and lower Yangtze River.- Part II: Development and application of soil loss models for soil loss prediction in the Shangshe catchment, Dabie Mountains, China.- Calculation of water and sediment discharge using an integral calculus method.- Development of the GOIUG model with a focus on the influence of land use in the Shangshe catchment.- GIS-based ER-USLE model to predict soil loss in cultivated land.- Development and test of GIS based FUSLE model in sub-catchments of Chinese fir forest and pine forest in the Dabie Mountains, China.- Spatial Variability of Soil Erodibility (K-Factor) at a Catchment Scale in Nanjing, China.- Application of a GIS-based revised FER-USLE model in the Shangshe catchment.- Part III:Practices of soil erosion control in eastern China.- Theory of vegetation reconstruction for various management types with different site conditions.- Models of reforestation for soil erosion control in the hilly region of the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River.- Effect of afforestation on soil and water conservation.- A study on plant roots and soil anti-scourability in the Shangshe catchment, Dabie mountains of Anhui Province, China.- Social and economic benefits of forest reconstruction.- Index.