Ecological compensation standards and the allocation of compensation funds have always been the core issues of watershed ecological compensation. Due to the construction of the Eastern Route of the South-to-North Water Transfer Project (SNWTP), Jiangsu Province has paid a huge cost for the protection of water resources, and local economic development has been greatly affected. Therefore, this paper takes Jiangsu Province, the water source area of the Eastern Route of the SNWTP as an example, and combines a geographic information system (GIS) and remote sensing technology, using the ecosystem services value method to calculate the ecosystem services value of Jiangsu Province from 2005 to 2018. Then the change of this ecosystem services value in Jiangsu Province from 2015 to 2018 is taken as the basis for watershed ecological compensation standards of the Eastern Route. Through a compensation fund allocation model, watershed ecological compensation funds are allocated to four cities, Yangzhou, Huai’an, Suqian and Xuzhou, which are located along the Eastern Route of this SNWTP in Jiangsu Province. The results show that: (1) The ecosystem services value of Jiangsu Province has changed greatly. Urbanization and market environment of grain crops are the main reasons for this change; (2) the relationship between ecosystem services in Jiangsu Province is mainly synergistic; (3) Suqian receives US$24.73 million; Huai’an receives US$16.49 million; Yangzhou receives US$54.88 million and Xuzhou receives US$0.95 million in watershed ecological compensation, respectively. Watershed ecological compensation standards based upon the value of ecosystem services, and the allocation of compensation funds at the municipal level, are conducive to the improvement in efficiency of watershed ecological compensation in mainland China.

The Beijing–Tianji–Hebei region (BTHR) is economically developed and densely populated, but its water resources are extremely scarce. A clear understanding of the decoupling relationship between water footprint and economic growth is conducive to facilitating and realizing the coordinated development of water resources and economic growth in this region. This study calculated the water footprint and other related indicators of BTHR from 2004 to 2017, and objectively evaluated the utilization of water resources in the region. Then, logarithmic mean divisia index (LMDI) method was applied to study the driving factors that resulted in the change of water footprint and their respective effects. Finally, Tapio decoupling model was used to research the decoupling relationships between water footprint and economic growth, and between the driving factors of water footprint and economic growth. There are three main results in this research. (1) The water utilization efficiency in BTHR continues to improve, and the water footprint shows a gradually increasing trend during the research period, among which the agricultural water footprint accounts for a relatively high proportion. (2) The change of water footprint can be attributed to efficiency effect, economic effect, and population effect. Furthermore, efficiency effect is the decisive factor of water footprint reduction and economic effect is the main factor of water footprint increase, while population effect plays a weak role in promoting the increase in water footprint. (3) The decoupling status between water footprint and economic growth show a weak decoupling in most years, while the status between water footprint intensity and economic growth always remains strong decoupling. Moreover, population size and economic growth always show an expansive coupling state. In sum, it is advisable for policy makers to improve water utilization efficiency, especially agricultural irrigation efficiency, to raise residents’ awareness of water conservation, and increase the import of water-intensive products, so as to alleviate water shortage and realize the coordinated development of water resources and economic growth in BTHR.

The security of water resources is the core content and ultimate goal of urban water resource management agencies. The management of water resources is directly related to the needs of urban residents’ lives and the area’s socio-economic development. How to determine the effective evaluation indicators and methods is an important prerequisite to solving the water resource security problem. This study took Luoyang City as the research area and constructed a water resource security evaluation index system based on pressure-state-response framework. An analytic hierarchy process and entropy weight method were used to determine the index weight. A set pair analysis model was then introduced to evaluate the security of water resources in Luoyang from 2006 to 2016. The results of this study show that the standard of water resource security generally improved in Luoyang in the latter years of the study period. From 2006 to 2008, Luoyang was graded at the Insecurity Level. This compares to a slightly improved grading of Critical Security Level from 2009 to 2016 (except for 2013). However, the overall grade is still low. The pressure on the Luoyang water resource system mainly comes from the development of the urban socio-economy, which in turn has caused problems for both the quantity and quality of water resources. Therefore, a series of countermeasures have been introduced as a means of improving the water resource security of Luoyang, and these measures have achieved certain results. However, further improvements to the efficiency of water resource utilization and strengthening the management and protection of water resources remain necessary.

Transboundary water pollution is a long-standing problem in China, although the Chinese government has been committed to the protection of water resources. Due to the different interests of multilevel governments and the regionalization of management, there is still no unified plan to solve the transboundary water pollution in China. Watershed ecological compensation as a holistic plan to deal with transboundary water pollution is being promoted currently. Taking the South-to-North Water Transfer Project’ eastern route as an example, this paper firstly analyses stakeholders’ strategies and establishes a tripartite game model based on evolutionary game theory. Secondly, by introducing Cobb Douglas production function creatively, the supervision level of the central government is refined into supervisory attitude and supervisory skills. Thirdly, the numerical simulation is used to analyze the sensitivity of influencing factors. The results show that: (1) whether the central government supervises the local governments mainly depends on the benefits of water environment improvement and supervision costs; (2) the initial negotiation plan of the stakeholders has a significant impact on their optimum strategies; (3) the fines imposed by the central government on the local governments have a small impact on the stable state of the system; (4) the higher the eco-compensation fee, the lower their likelihood of cooperation; (5) the central government’s supervisory attitude and supervisory skills have significant effect on the sustainability of the optimum arrangement, even when willingness of upstream and downstream governments to cooperate is low; (6) the initial ecological benefits of downstream governments have no effect on the optimum strategy. Therefore, considering these insights is helpful to improve the watershed ecological compensation mechanism in order to solve transboundary water pollution and achieve the sustainability of water resources.

The evaluation of the sustainable utilization of water resources is an important factor to measure whether the water resources can support the local coordinated development of population, economy and environment. Our study used Henan Province as the research area, which has a relative shortage of water resources (average water resources per capita, ≤400 m³). The Drivers, Pressures, State, Impact, Response (DPSIR) model was used to construct the evaluation index system, utilizing the entropy weight method and the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method to determine the index weight. The sustainable utilization of water resources in 18 cities of Henan Province from 2006 to 2015 was evaluated using the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to an Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) model. The results show a steady upward trend, from worst to general, but there is a great difference between each city. The overall level was still on the low side, and the influence of each subsystem in the comprehensive index of the sustainable utilization of water resources varies. The evaluation results are basically in line with the actual situation of economic and social development in Henan Province, which has a guiding significance for improving the level of sustainable utilization of water resources in the region.