The arid areas of northwest China are facing a shortage of water resources, and this is further aggravated because of desertification caused by climate warming as well as lack of ecological water rights and long-term protection mechanisms for these areas. The contradicting prominent goals of ecology and resource economy additionally complicate this situation. In this paper, we discussed the problems and difficulties in the sustainable management of arid desert areas of northwest China, reported the level of ecological water and ecological threshold of vegetation conservation in desert ecosystems, and proposed a concept of ecosystem management in arid areas that included ecological integration in desert-oasis transition zone and ecological protection gradient of oasis ecosystem security. Based on multiyear field investigations of the extreme ecological conditions in arid areas, this paper integrates various models that can be used for desert vegetation restoration and reconstruction, including the model for the restoration of degraded communities and ecological diversity, optimal configuration, assembly of plant community structure and ecological integration technology, ecosystem restoration through water utilization and ecological self-maintenance technology, and root sprout regeneration technique for Populus euphratica. These techniques have been developed and integrated based on years of successful field experiments. These understandings can be used as a scientific basis and technological support for the sustainable management of arid desert ecosystems.