The
recent diplomatic spat between Indonesia and Singapore over the city-state’s
effort to prosecute an Indonesian businessman for his alleged involvement in
the haze last year was a frank reminder of the devastating impact man-made
disasters can have on the region.
Yet while
the regional haze — considered the worst since 1997 — attracted most of the
headlines around the world, another man-made disaster has struck the ASEAN
region virtually almost under the radar: the Mekong Delta drought.
The great
Mekong River — which from its source in the Tibetan plateau of China passes
through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam before flowing out to the
South China Sea — is at its lowest level in a century after experiencing its
worst dry spell in 90 years.
Experts
suggest a combination of the stronger than-normal El Niño weather pattern,
climate change and, most worryingly, the construction of dams along Mekong
River, are responsible for this disaster.
At an
estimated 4,350 kilometers in length, it should be remembered that the Mekong
River provides livelihoods to an estimated 60 million people who live along its
basin, with 90 percent of Vietnam’s rice export coming from the Mekong Delta
and Cambodia’s fresh water lake of Tonle Sap providing 60 percent of
Cambodians’ protein intake.
Indeed,
the fishery sector of the Lower Mekong Basin is estimated at a total value of
US$17 billion per year.
At the
same time, the implications of the Mekong Delta drought go beyond the Mekong
subregion.
As
Richard Cronin from the Stimson Center in the United States notes, “People in
Indonesia and the Philippines will go hungry if the Thais and Vietnamese don’t
produce enough rice […] this is a preview of the longer-term effect of development
and climate change to the Mekong Delta.”
A total
of 11 mainstream hydropower dams and a further 30 tributary dams have been
proposed for construction over the next 20 years.
These
include the controversial Xayaburi Dam in Laos which has drawn opposition from
neighboring Cambodia and Vietnam. The arguments in favor of such dam projects
are that they provide cheaper electricity, will fuel economic development and
alleviate poverty.
For a
land-locked, impoverished country such as Laos with limited natural resources
and a gross domestic product (GDP) of only $12 billion, the economic argument
in favor of dam construction is obvious. Aiming for 7 percent GDP growth, the
Lao government hopes to export the energy produced by its hydropower dams to
neighboring countries.
Despite
this, question marks have been raised over the supposed economic benefits and
the purported minimal environmental impacts claimed by governments and dam
companies.
Critics
argue that existing and future dams threaten to reduce fish stocks, decrease
the sediments needed for rice harvest, change the quality and quantity of water
flows, and lead to unpredictable surges that will have major consequences on
communities in the Mekong subregion.
These
concerns appear to have materialized with one expert arguing fish yields have
dropped by up to 70 percent due to hydropower dams and that whereas villagers
reported they could catch 5 to 10 kilograms of fish a day 10 years ago, the
catch has gone down to 1 to 2kg a day at present.
At the
same time, changes to water flows caused by dams have affected rice yields.
Areas that used to be dry in the dry season are now permanently inundated and
areas that used to be flooded in the wet season remain dry.
For
Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, which relies on the annual floods during the wet season
to provide nutrient-rich sediments for its rice fields, such unseasonal
droughts are devastating. One Vietnamese official suggested that mainstream
hydropower projects on the Mekong River had caused a loss of $231 million in
seafood and agriculture output to the Mekong Delta.
Given the
transboundary nature of the issues surrounding water resource security in the
Mekong subregion, it is unsurprising that efforts have been made at the
regional level to ensure greater cooperation. The most notable regional
mechanism is the Mekong Agreement of 1995 which established the Mekong River
Commission (MRC).
MRC,
however, is ineffective to manage the transboundary water resources due to the
lack of legally binding agreements. Criticisms have also been made of the
Mekong Agreement 1995 itself for its vague definitions of key terms such as the
acceptable minimum monthly natural flow and natural reverse flow, and for the
limited “notification” procedure that is required by riparian states to inform
others about their water development projects.
As one
expert pointed out, the agreement means upstream dams in Laos do not require
the prior informed consent of Cambodia even though it may have a negative
impact downstream.
As far
back as 1997 ASEAN had already recognized the need to develop a regional water
conservation program as stated in the Hanoi Plan of Action. Similarly in 2003,
ASEAN senior officials on the environment adopted the ASEAN Long Term Strategic
Plan for Water Resources Management, which identified five key challenges
including moving towards integrated river basin management.
Two years
later in 2005, ASEAN produced the ASEAN Strategic Plan of Action on Water
Resources Management. Recognizing the importance of greater cooperation among
riparian states in the Mekong subregion, in 2010 the ASEAN Secretariat
announced at a signing ceremony in Hua Hin, Thailand, a partnership agreement
with the MRC “in the development and management of the Mekong’s water
resources”.
Despite
all the efforts, it should be noted that the results of the institutional
partnership between ASEAN and the MRC are “limited” due to lack of political
will, leadership and resource mobilization.
Tellingly,
at the 2010 signing ceremony, the then ASEAN Secretary-General did not attend
but was instead represented by the Director of Finance and Infrastructure
Directorate of the ASEAN Secretariat.
Moreover,
the attendant community blueprints to the ASEAN Community Vision 2025 rarely
mentions water resource security.
Indeed
the term “water resources” is only found once under the ASEAN Socio-Cultural
Community Blueprint 2025. Limiting water resources to the socio-cultural pillar
is in stark contrast to the riparian states that identify it as a matter of
national security.
One
Cambodian think tank argues that “national state security is inextricably
linked to water usage and management, and the stability of Cambodia as a state
can in this manner be disrupted by factors contributing to water insecurity”.
In this sense it is questionable why the issue was not included in the ASEAN
Political-Security Community Blueprint 2025.
As such,
while regional efforts to ensure water resource security in the Mekong Delta
have been made, they have clearly not gone far enough. More attention needs to
be given to water resource security in the Mekong subregion and it should be
recognized by ASEAN as an issue of critical concern for the region, that has
implications that go beyond the riparian states, and that it is a cross-pillar
issue that cannot be limited to the socio-cultural realm. The lives of 60
million ASEAN citizens depend on it!
A Ibrahim
Almuttaqi
The writer heads the ASEAN Studies Program at
The Habibie Center in Jakarta. The views expressed are his own.
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