The history of irrigation and water control in the Lake Erhai Catchment, Yunnan Province, China: mitigation and adaptation to environmental and climate change

Abstract

This chapter introduces an interdisciplinary methodology, which combines the use of archaeological and documentary sources alongside environmental proxy indicators found in sedimentary archives, to assess on a hydrological catchment scale historical human impacts on hydrology. The advantages and benefits of this technique are demonstrated through the results taken from ongoing work on a case study, Erhai in Yunnan province, China. This approach allows us to increase understanding of local knowledge, vulnerability, mitigation, adaptation and resilience to local, regional and globally derived environment and climate change.