Kuo Chen-tai, a professor of civil engineering at National Taiwan University (NTU), suggests that when Taiwan's predominant land use was agriculture, and water regulation measures also revolved around farmland water conservancy, if there was flooding then human casualties and production losses tended to be less serious.
台灣大學土木系教授郭振泰指出，過去台灣的土地利用以農業掛帥，水利事業的興修也多著重在農田水利的建設上，這個時期若發生水患，人員與產業的損失都較不嚴重。