Abstract: To investigate the water area in Jiangsu province, we extracted eight categories of water area in Jiangsu province in 2012 by using aerial remote sensing images with spatial resolution of 0.3 meters according to water conservancy census data and 1∶10 000 stream data. The result shows that the total water area of Jiangsu Province in 2012 was 22 433.2 km², including lake area 6 271.0 km², fish pond area within the scope of provincial lakes 637.5 km², river area 5 042.9 km²,reservoir area 480.4 km²,small reservoir area 39.8 km²,waterlogging area around Hongze Lake 1 590.0 km², waterlogging area around Lixia river 595.4 km², fish pond area 5 322.5 km², and ditch area 2 453.8 km². The results are of high precision, and provide support of basic data for dynamic supervision of provincial and local government waters, the monitoring of water surface change, and for the basic modernization index of water conservancy. Moreover, it also provides monitoring data for the provincial administrative enforcement and administrative law enforcement system.

Key words: water area in Jiangsu Province, remote sensing monitoring, aerial image, water classification, water conservancy census