Earthquakes are a major threat to lives, livelihoods, and economic development in China. Of the 2-2.5 million deaths in earthquakes worldwide since 1900, at least 650,000 have occurred in China. Chinese earthquakes have caused three of the ten highest death tolls in earthquakes since 1900 and have led to estimated losses of $678 billion (in 2012 USD). The 2008 Wenchuan earthquake alone caused direct economic losses of more than RMB840 billion, despite affecting largely rural areas of Sichuan province and causing only minor damage to the provincial capital of Chengdu. A future earthquake in China could cause catastrophic losses, and disaster risk reduction (DRR) efforts in China are therefore of critical importance. Local communities play a critical role in DRR preparation and planning. In the immediate aftermath of a large earthquake, communities are often cut off from outside resources and assistance, and must rely on their own plans and capacities. This is especially true of communities in remote or mountainous areas like northwestern China. While DRR planning in China has traditionally followed a very centralised approach, there is growing recognition of the importance of community-based disaster risk reduction (CBDRR) efforts. Most notably, the Ministry of Civil Affairs has embarked on a major programme to establish a network of thousands of 'demonstration communities' that have met minimum requirements for local-scale disaster preparedness. The proposed research is specifically aimed at supporting and enhancing the MoCA programme. Our work will ensure that it draws on broad scientific knowledge of the hazard, including secondary earthquake hazards such as landslides. Our work will also explore the factors that make communities more or less willing to engage in CBDRR, so that the MoCA programme can best reflect the broad diversity of communities that are exposed to that hazard. We will first look at the ways in which CBDRR is achieved in China, and how these approaches compare to those in other earthquake-prone countries. At the same time, we will produce a new inventory of landslides in northwestern China (an area that includes Gansu, Shaanxi, and Ningxia provinces), and will generate new knowledge on the sizes and effects of past landslides as a guide to landslide hazard in future earthquakes. Finally, we will work with two specific communities to find out their priority concerns and their awareness of the hazards that they face, and to come up with ideas for how they might deal with those hazards in a future earthquake. The emphasis of our work will be on sustained engagement with groups of engaged citizens to come up with solutions that will work in their communities. The goal throughout will be to take a community-centred approach to understanding the choices that people make to protect themselves from earthquakes. The project will lead to (1) new knowledge of landslide hazard in the region; (2) better understanding of the factors that help communities to engage with DRR issues; and (3) strategies for local earthquake resilience that complement and extend the National Five-Year Plans for Comprehensive Disaster Reduction. By increasing resilience at the community level to the damaging earthquakes that will surely occur across this region in future, the project will make a direct contribution to sustainable growth and economic welfare. The research and training that we propose will increase local capacity to assess and plan for the effects of future earthquakes. Finally, China has engaged in constructive cooperation in south-south exchanges of knowledge in DRR, e.g. through the CBDM Asia project. We are keen to contribute to these exchanges and wider economic development of the region by sharing the outcomes of this research with partners in other earthquake-prone countries across Asia.

The Earth's surface (soil and plants), and the rock underneath interact, linked by rainwater flowing through the soil into the rock. The soil imparts a chemical signature to the water, sometimes bad leading to loss of water quality. This signature is mediated by movement through the rock, and then, when underground water re-emerges, in streams and rivers by bacterial activity. As such, how this outer layer of planet Earth functions is 'critical' to key needs of mankind - how much water we have available and its quality; how well the soil functions as a result of water draining through it. The study of how these layers interact is thus called 'critical zone' research. Our research programme uses such 'critical zone' research in an environment where the local residents face significant environmental challenges - in rural China, an area of rapid growth and where many live under the poverty line. This is a joint research programme between UK and China. We will focus on two of these challenges: water availability and quality, and how movement of water in the critical zone influences surface vegetation. Crucial to this research is that the underlying rock is mostly limestone. Limestone is easily dissolved and water can move very quickly through the subsurface. So soils may dry sooner (as the subsurface beneath is freely-draining) and there is limited water storage on the surface and underground. Limestone is widely distributed world-wide, but particularly in China and so study here is relevant to many world-wide. The people living in the catchment generally live-off-the-land. It provides their water and food - a phenomenon known as the ecosystem providing services. Where the slopes are not too steep, the land surface is heavily-cultivated. This in turn presents problems e.g., the water quality is poor, with dangerously high-level of nitrate (a chemical that is found in fertiliser); clearance of vegetation exposes rock, limiting how land may be used. Further challenging to local residents is that the climate is changing. How rain is delivered to the catchment has been changing such that water is not available as before. Thus there have also been water shortages, and this led to crop failure and so loss of food. Land use change is important in shaping these ecosystem services, but climate change may be one of the most significant threats the residents will face; science must help them prepare for facing these threats with successful outcomes. Our research will generate models of how the critical zone functions currently and from these we can then investigate how the critical zone functioning may adapt to different environmental drivers. There is a large body of scientific modelling outside this project that has identified how the climate may change. Thus, we can draw on this to run the models we will develop of the critical zone functioning, not only under land use change, but also under future climate scenarios. All this research will contribute to understanding where this catchment critical zone is most sensitive to future threats. However, it is important that this understanding reaches the people who need to use it. So the final activity we will undertake comes under the umbrella of 'knowledge exchange' - sharing our findings with those who need this research, and adjusting our understanding based on knowledge they too have. Thus our last, but not least, activity is working with those who live in the landscape and those who manage it, to help them identify how their activities can cause the least harm and offer the most protection to their ecosystem services. Our collaboration with Chinese colleagues is therefore crucial. We bring new skills to the project (e.g. new hydrological modelling skills) that they will benefit from. Additionally as catchment management practices will be quite different across UK-China, they will learn about other good practice to help improve their environment and remove residents from poverty