Abstract:  A revised growth drag model for economic development and urbanization progress in the arid area is established based on energy, land and water resources. Korla, a fast developing city in southern Xinjiang
Autonomous Region, western China, is taken as an example. Our result shows that，compared with other resources, water resources have much more constrain on Korla’s economy development and urbanization progress，
of which the growth drag is up to 1. 97%and 9. 2’1%.Obvious，due to its specific natural environment, the scarce，constrained and irreplaceable water resources becomes the main restrictive factor on the economy and urbanization of
the northwestern arid area of China. Also，the growth drag of the economy is about 5 times than that of the urbanization progress，which shows that water’s constrain on economy will reflect in times on the urbanization
progress. Korla should focus on the following approaches to reduce the growth drag of urbanization from water resources.The first is to increase the elastic coefficient of the capital.The second approach is to improve the
protection of ecological environment，to develop environmental protection industry, and to establish agriculture and animal husbandry composite or agriculture and forestry composite system.The third approach is to mcrcasc mcome
and to reduce expenditure simultaneously, and save water resources vigorously and utilize it intensively.