Upon the approval of the State Council, Ministry of Water Resources released the Name-list of National Flood Detention Basins on January 7^th, 2010. Relevant provinces (municipalities directly under the central government) and river basin authorities are required to properly handle the matter related to the utilization and compensation of flood detention basins according to “Temporal Measures for the Utilization Compensation of Detention Basins” and other relevant regulations.

In May 2000, the State Council issued “Temporal Measures for the Utilization Compensation of Detention Basins” and identified 97 national detention basins. Recent years, the State Council successively approved the flood control plans of seven large river basins as well as arrangement for the distribution of detention basins. According to these plans, the name-list of national detention basins is revised and made public.

There are 98 detention basins in this revision list that is one more than that of the original list. The number of detention areas in the Yangtze River Basin grows to 44 from 40, 2 from 5 in the Yellow River Basin, 28 from 26 in Hai River Basin, 21 from 26 in the Huai River Basin, 2 more in the Songhua River Basin and 1 more in the Pearl River Basin. Besides, although 8 detention basins in the Huai River Basin (Shangliufang Dike, Xialiufang Dike, Shiyaowan, Luohe Lake, Fangqiu Lake, Linbeiduan, Xiangfuduan and Pancun Lake) are no longer recorded in the list of national detention basins, the Temporal Measures for the Utilization Compensation of Detention Basins is still valid towards these 8 detention basins before the completion of the planned projects in case they would be used for floodwater diversion.