Xiaolangdi Resettlement - A Model for the Future
Xiaolangdi Dam is of critical importance to China. It will provide flood
control in the lower reaches of the Yellow River Basin to protect major
infrastructure and 103 million people; control siltation in the 800-kilometer
downstream channel of the river (so that levees will not have to be raised
further for the next twenty years); provide irrigation for 2 million hectares;
and generate 1,800 megawatts of hydropower. Constructing the dam and filling
the reservoir will necessitate the resettlement of more than 180,000 people,
the largest resettlement operations assisted by Bank financing.
A pathbreaking approach was taken to addressing the complexities of this
resettlement operation. First, a separate project and a separate Bank credit
were created, distinct from the dam project and loan, to ensure a high level
of attention, staff inputs, and budgetary resources. The purpose of the
project is to restore and improve the resettlers' income. To that end, the
project will construct infrastructure and housing for 276 villages and ten
towns; develop 11,100 hectares of new land, of which 7,000 will be irrigated;
relocate 252 existing small industries and mines; and establish 84 new industries
with 20,500 new jobs. The project will benefit about half a million people
and create about 75,220 full-time jobs and about 37,400 part-time jobs.
The economic rate of return for the overall project is estimated at 32 percent.
The Chinese have had success in other dam projects since the adoption of
new policies and strategies, with Bank assistance, in the mid-1980s. In
the nearly completed resettlement of 67,000 people at the Shuikou Hydroelectric
project, also in eastern China, resettler incomes exceeded previous incomes
by up to 10 percent within a year after transfer. So far, the experience
from Xiaolangdi Dam shows that the income levels of the first 2,000 people
resettled during the early construction have exceeded their previous incomes
by 10 to 60 percent within one year.
Xiaolangdi has the highest resettlement budjet per person of any project
in China and far above the average among resettlement projects. Unparalleled
human resources have been put into the preparation of the extremely detailed
resttlement plan. Five alternatives to the Xiaolangdi Dam were considered,
but each would have required significantly greater resettlement, ranging
from 250,000 to 930,000 people. Although resettlement always remains a difficult
and unpredictable task, Xiaolangdi has minimized the number of people to
be moved and has taken extensive precautionary measures to prevent impoverishment
of the resettlers and, moreover, to improve their lives.
Excerpts from "Making Development Sustainable," a report prepared
by the Environment Department of the World Bank, The International Bank
for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank, 1994.