Overwhelming wetland reclamation confronts severe flood risks.

Authors

Xi Zhang, Jinwei Dong, Yiqun Shang, Xi Chen, Xinxin Wang, Qiang Zhang, Ruoqi Liu, Shushi Peng, Dehua Mao, Xiaogang He, Yong Ge, Xiangming Xiao

Published in

Science bulletin. Aug 07, 2026. Epub Aug 07, 2026.

Abstract

Agricultural expansion under rising food demand has resulted in over half of global wetland loss, yet the flood risks faced by wetland-reclaimed croplands (WRCs) remain poorly understood. Focusing on China, a major grain-producing country with extensive wetland resources, we found that wetland reclamation converted 4818 km² of wetlands into croplands, accounting for 35% of total wetland loss from 2000 to 2020, with pronounced concentrations in Northeast China. Flood occurrence also exhibited strong spatial heterogeneity: the middle Yangtze River and Northeast China both had high baseline frequencies, but trends diverged, with 80% of pixels showing positive slopes in the former and 73% showing negative slopes in the latter. More than 70% of WRCs were located in flood-prone regions, nearly 90% had experienced at least one flood event, and over half showed increasing flood frequency. A further counterfactual analysis showed that WRCs experienced higher flood frequency relative to matched non-reclaimed areas, suggesting a potential amplification of flood risks by wetland reclamation. These findings reveal substantial flood-related sustainability challenges for cropland expansion through wetland reclamation and underscore the urgent need to reconcile food security with wetland conservation.

PMID:
42608272
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 18 Aug 2026.

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