Abstract: Water conservation function of forest ecosystem is an important aspect of forest ecosystem service function, which has received wide attention from the society. After the development for more than half a century, China has made some progress in understanding the function and mechanism of water conservation in forests, developing the value evaluation of water conservation function, and serving the construction and management of water conservation forests. However, there are still controversies in interpreting the connotation of forest water conservation function and the underlying mechanism, which severely limits the practical application of relevant research results. After summarizing current research status, we expounded the basic connotation, the process mechanism and the comprehensive characteristics of forest water conservation function. We proposed research aspects in the future, which would serve the evaluation of forest ecosystem service and the management of ecological public welfare forests.

Key words: water conservation, hydrological function, ecosystem service, ecological public welfare forest.