Mr. Cai Ximing, President of Chinese American Water Resources Association (CAWRA) and professor of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, visited IWHR on January 13, 2017 and delivered a lecture on water resources research at IWHR’s Global Vision Forum. Vice President Hu Chunhong and Peng Jing met with Prof. Cai.

Vice President Hu Chunhong extended his warm welcome to Prof. Cai for visiting IWHR and delivering IWHR’s first lecture of 2017. He reviewed the great support CAWRA had provided in promoting the exchanges of water resources science and technology across the Straits, and the challenges and tasks facing China in water resources management. Vice President Hu hoped to move forward the existing cooperation with CAWRA in academic exchange, co-publishing papers, project collaboration and other fields to deepen the friendship and achieve win-win development.

Prof. Cai Ximing thanked IWHR for the warm reception. He made a general review of the CAWRA history and the cooperation with IWHR in water resources science and technology communication, especially special seminars held on hot and focal water issues. He also proposed suggestions on cooperation on sustainable water resources development and renewable energy.

Later on, Prof. Cai lectured at IWHR Global Vision Forum with the title of Observations and Thoughts on Water Resources Research, in which he reviewed the historical evolution and development of water resources management and hydrology research, introduced the new concept of social hydrology, emphasized the importance of human social factors in river basin hydrological models, discussed the role of hydrology in water resources reallocation, water-food-energy nexus and internet physical system, and put forward his ideas and thoughts for the development of next-generation hydrological models. The lecture triggered many reactions from the audience and led to a heated discussion.