Environmental impact assessment of rural land consolidation in China

In Chinese land use practice, land consolidation has contributed a lot to realizing the rational disposition of land resources and improving the land use efficiency and the ecological environment. Environmental Impact Assessment(EIA) Law of China for the land use practice requires proceeding environmental impact assessment. Rural Land Consolidation(RLC) is the main mode of land consolidation. It is essential to study the RLC of EIA. The upcoming revision of RLC of EIA was analyzed. And then, the potential environmental impacts of the RLC on landscape, soil, the diversity of living creature, water resources, the plant cover of land, atmosphere were discussed systematically. The impact is potential or obvious, which may be positive or negative. Based on the study, the scope, index and assessment method for RLC of EIA were proposed.