China News Service, Changtai, Fujian, October 15th. Title: Changtai Longjin Ancient Pi: Ancient water flows forever and is born into the new.
Authors Zhang Jinchuan Zheng Xiaomei Lin Tingting
The Longjin Ancient Pei Irrigation Project, located on both sides of Longjin Creek in Changtai District, Zhangzhou, Fujian Province, is represented by the two ancient water conservancy projects Yanfu Pei and Shiwuhu Pei. It was built during the Jiading period of the Southern Song Dynasty and has a history of more than 800 years. It still nourishes nearly 30,000 acres of fertile fields and has become a living example of Eastern water control wisdom.
On the evening of October 14th, Beijing time, at the 77th Executive Council of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage held in Marseille, France, the 2026 (thirteenth batch) World Irrigation Engineering Heritage List was announced. Changtai Longjin Gupi Irrigation Project was successfully included on the list, becoming the first world irrigation engineering heritage in southern Fujian.
Why does Longjin Ancient Pei continue to thrive? The answer lies in the ingenious construction techniques of the ancients. The terrain of Changtai is high in the north and low in the south. Since ancient times, "spring and summer are prone to waterlogging when it rains a lot, and autumn and winter when there is less rain and are prone to drought." Longjin Gupi has solved the dilemma of relying on the sky with its unique model of "low dam to divert water + long vines to produce melons".
"This is an outstanding project that uses low dams to divert water, control irrigation, storage and drainage, and create symbiosis between people and rivers in the hilly areas of the southeast." Ye Wenhui, deputy director of the Water Conservancy Bureau of Changtai District, Zhangzhou, said while standing at the head of the Yanfu Pi Canal. "We do not build high dams or cut off the river. We only build a low stone dam to moderately raise the water level. This not only reduces the difficulty of construction, but also reduces the impact on the river ecology. It can also overflow naturally when floods come."
According to modern engineering surveying and mapping, the height difference between the canal head and the spillway at Yanfupi and Shiwuhupi is 15.68 meters and 18.78 meters respectively, which is accurate to the centimeter level. In the Song Dynasty, when there were no precise measuring instruments, the ancients realized full gravity irrigation and maximized the irrigation area by constantly surveying the terrain and judging the topography of mountains and rivers. Low dams have limited water diversion and storage, so the ancients used the wisdom of "growing vines to grow melons" to fill the gap: the irrigation canals extending vertically and horizontally are spreading "vines", and the ponds and farmland connected along the way are the "melons" on the vines. Water is stored in the wet season and released in the dry season, forming a distributed reservoir system to achieve both storage and discharge.
The vitality of the project lies not only in the sophistication of the technology, but also in the resilience of the water management system. As early as the Song Dynasty, Changtai established the "Bei Chief System", selecting talented and virtuous people as the Bei Chief, responsible for patrolling canals, dredging, and regulating water use. The rules of "irrigation according to regulations according to acres" and "irrigation according to daily rotation" are engraved on steles along the line, which are still followed today. But in the new era, "old rules" are also paired with "new technologies." Through the smart water conservancy system, the project has realized real-time monitoring of water levels and remote dispatching of gates, and the water management efficiency has been greatly improved.
The construction story of Gupi is even more touching. Ye Xiaoqiu, director of the Party History and Local Chronicles Research Office of the Changtai District Committee of Zhangzhou, said, "Squire Yan Fu of the Southern Song Dynasty presided over the construction of Yanfu Pei; more than ten years later, squire Chen Qi took the initiative to donate more than 240 acres of his own farmland to build fifteen households of Pei."
Thanks to stable irrigation, Changtai has been rich in a variety of fruits since the Tang and Song Dynasties; local specialties such as tangerines, amomum villosum and taro were listed as tributes to the imperial court; food crops grew "unbridled", and the 30,000-acre irrigated area became a grain-producing area with stable and high yields despite droughts and floods. Changtai has gradually developed into a veritable "Treasure Land of Southern Fujian".
