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Delta takes urgent steps to prevent drought
Last year’s drought devastated crops and caused serious losses for
farmers in the Mekong Delta. This year, authorities are restructuring crops,
building dykes and erecting sluices in anticipation of continuing weather
disasters.
The official
attitude of provincial authorities in the Mekong Delta region this year could
be deemed “forewarned is forearmed”.
Authorities
are determined to prevent a recurrence of the disaster that struck last year
after the worst drought in 90 years, along with serious saline intrusion,
affected the entire region.
This year,
the Delta is storing as much fresh water as possible. Dykes have been
upgraded, sluices erected, and crops restructured. Master plans on
climate-change adaptation are being reviewed and adjusted.
Predictions
are that saline intrusion will be at a higher level this year in comparison
with previous years. But it will be lower and less serious than last year,
according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development’s Irrigation
General Department.
Salty water
is already beginning to enter the Delta and will increase by early March.
Kiên Giang
Province in the southwestern area of the Delta has taken precautionary
measures by investing more than VNĐ40 billion (US$1.8 million) to upgrade 276
dykes and build sluices on the Kiên River and Cụt Canal.
Another
VNĐ20 billion ($900,000) has been spent on drilling more wells to ensure
fresh water for domestic use.
The
province has also worked closely with the neighbouring province of An Giang
on “a proper plan to use water resources”, according to Nguyễn Văn Tâm, the
director of Kiên Giang’s Agriculture and Rural Development Department.
Authorities
have made careful plans for the winter-autumn crop, based on the availability
of water resources in different localities.
In Bạc Liêu
Province, hot weather and salinity have been occurring since early February.
The
province, working with the neighbouring provinces of Cà Mau and Sóc Trăng, is
now operating 100 major sluices to adjust the usage level of fresh water.
More than
40 temporary dykes have been built, and farmers have been warned to preserve
fresh water.
In an
attempt to prevent saline intrustion and preserve soil quality, the entire
region has also reduced the number of rice crops planted from three to two
each year. The extra time will be used for vegetable cultivation.
Tiền Giang
in the coastal region, for example, has already shifted 2,500 hectares of
land to vegetable cultivation.
Master plan
Opinions
about a master plan for the Delta to cope with climate change vary among
experts, but all agree that it must be adjusted and completed as soon as
possible.
Dr Tăng Đức
Thắng of the Southern Institute of Water Resource Research said: “The Delta
needs a long-term master plan to cope with drought and salinity, as it is one
of several places in the world that will suffer the most from climate change.”
This year,
the amount of fresh water in the Mekong River is estimated to be 15-35 per
cent lower in comparison with previous years, according to a report from the
General Department of Irrigation.
“Water-related
development in the Mekong upstream has already affected agricultural
production and daily life, and it will have a more serious impact in the
future,” Thắng said.
“The
government should give priority to investing in salinity-control sluices
along the Tiền and Hậu rivers and modernising irrigation by using automatic
measurements and connecting independent irrigation systems to a larger
system,” he added.
To cope
with changes in weather, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
has made a 2016-20 action plan, which links agricultural production and rural
development in the Mekong Delta.
Under the
plan, rice is now mainly cultivated in the Đồng Tháp Mười (Plain of Reeds)
sub-region, which includes the provinces of Long An, Đồng Tháp and Tiền Giang.
Coconuts
and pomelos are grown in a sub-region traversed by the Tiền and Hậu rivers in
the provinces of Tiền Giang, Vĩnh Long, Trà Vinh and Bến Tre. And shrimp are
farmed mostly in the sub-region of the Cà Mau peninsula, which includes Sóc
Trăng, Cà Mau, Bạc Liêu and Kiên Giang provinces.
As part of
the plan, rice and catfish are now the major products in the sub-region of
Long Xuyên, which includes the provinces of Hậu Giang, An Giang, Cần Thơ and
Kiên Giang.
Trần Công
Thắng, deputy head of the Institute of Policy and Strategy for Agriculture
and Rural Development, said that while the government had taken action to
cope with climate change, more solutions were needed.
“Việt Nam
has built more irrigation dykes and sluices, enhanced measurements and
warnings, provided more financial and technical support, changed timetables
for crop farming, shifted farm lland from rice to vegetables, and planted new
rice seeds resilient to drought and salinity,” he said.
“But all of
these measures have limitations and we still lack long-term, sustainable
solutions for the region,” he added.
However, Dr
Andrew Wyatt, the Mekong Delta programme manager at the International Union
for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Việt Nam, told Việt Nam News that
the Mekong Delta Plan had already covered many of the most pressing issues.
The plan
was created in 2013 by Việt Nam and the Netherlands under a Strategic
Partnership Arrangement on Climate-Change Adaptation and Water Management.
“The Mekong
Delta Plan has carefully noted all of the climate-change impacts that would
affect the region over the long term, and all suggestions have been properly
given under the 100-year plan,” Wyatt said.
The master
plan is currently being reviewed and adjustments will be made, according to
Wyatt.
Salinity:
friend or foe?
“I think
Vietnamese authorities and local communities should change their views and
consider salinity as an opportunity to develop in a new way,” Wyatt said,
adding that agricultural practices could be shifted to take advantage of
saline conditions.
Before Việt
Nam’s reunification in 1975, the Mekong Delta region had no dyke systems to
keep fresh water.
“In the
past, farmers knew how to cope with salinity, but now, after a long time of
being protected, they don’t know how to deal with it,” he added.
Wyatt said
that warnings about serious drought and salinity from local authorities to
local farmers had been ignored last year.
“Local
authorities should provide farmers with useful software that will help them
prepare for climate change,” he said.
Over the
years, the extensive irrigation system in the delta helped Việt Nam become
one of the biggest rice exporters in the world. However, changes to that
system have occurred.
“In many
places, like the southernmost province of Cà Mau, local farmers destroyed
irrigation systems and dykes so they could pump salt water into their shrimp
farms," he said. "So now, it’s time to carefully review
agricultural production in the region in the context of climate change."
Wyatt also
pointed out that in the past, only land in the middle of the Delta region
could grow fruit because it was not threatened by flooding or saline
intrusion at that time.
“Now,
fruit-growing areas have expanded and salinity could affect orchards because
fruit needs several years to grow,” he said.
Mangrove-shrimp
farming model
One
climate-adaptation project, a new integrated mangrove-shrimp farming model,
has been highly successful in the coastal region of the Delta.
Introduced
in Cà Mau, it has helped farmers earn more income, while preserving
mangrove swamps that aquaculture often destroys.
Many shrimp
farmers in the past, for example, cut down mangroves to build ponds for
shrimp, which thrive in salty water. This caused coastal erosion and
increased saline intrusion in inland farming areas.
The
mangrove-shrimp project, organised by the International Union for
Conservation of Nature and the Netherlands Development Organisation, was
first set up in Cà Mau Province’s Nhưng Mien Protective Forest with 1,075
households.
The project
goal is to help local shrimp farmers become more profitable by combining
farms with protected mangrove forests, thus increasing profitability and
sustainability while also enhancing coastal resilience to climate change.
Although
shrimp farming is one of Việt Nam’s leading export-related activities, it is
also the leading cause of mangrove loss in a country with a long, densely
populated coastline vulnerable to tropical storms and rising sea levels.
The
sustainability of the shrimp farming business and the conservation of mangroves
are both national priorities.
The
mangrove-shrimp project is funded by the German Federal Ministry of the
Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety.
It focuses
on a group of around 2,700 farmers who use an integrated model of farming
shrimp in mangrove forests in which each household has to earmark 60 per cent
of the land for mangroves.
While
farmers may have significantly lower yields per hectare than intensive shrimp
farms, the integrated model results in a highly diverse output, lower costs
and much lower risk of crop failure.
Not only is
this model resilient to disease, but it is also stable and profitable, with
incomes significantly higher than from traditional farming.
Households
receive training that allows them to acquire certification in raising shrimp
without industrial food or chemicals. Farmers also learn how to manage
household waste and protect forests.
“With the
model, local residents can earn a sustainable living while mangroves are
preserved and protect the coast,” Wyatt said.
Underground
water is also protected as the mangroves reduce water evaporation.
“If you can protect
underground water, you can help stop ground depression, and right now, the
Mekong Delta is expected to sink around 10 millimetres each year because of
excessive use of underground water,” Wyatt said.
By Phạm Hoàng Nam, Viet Nam News
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Thứ Hai, 13 tháng 3, 2017
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