ABSTRACT
China is a particularly mountainous country. Mountains cover about two-thirds of its total land area of 9.6 million km2 (Wang et al., 1986). China has a population of approximately 1.3 billion people, and about one-third of this, and two-fifths of the total cultivated land area, are distributed in the mountainous part of the country. Furthermore, there are rich water, mineral and forest resources in the mountainous areas, and these areas are also important for tourism. For these reasons, mountains are important for the economic development of the country and have great productive potential and vast development prospects. On the other hand, the mountains have complex geologic structures, intense geotectonic and earthquake activity and abundant water supply, as a result of the monsoonal climate, which combine to make China one of the countries most susceptible to mountain hazards. Since human economic activities have expanded to the mountain regions, exploitation of mountains has intensified these hazards. This chapter examines the types and distribution of mountain hazards, their impacts on socio-economic development and the techniques used in China to reduce the impacts of mountain hazards.
