UNEP 15 Dec 09;
Bangkok/Ha Noi, 15 December 2009 Climate change will have serious consequences for Viet Nam's Mekong and Red River Deltas - two key rice and agricultural producing areas in the country - unless global warming is addressed.
The Red River Delta, particularly Quang Ninh province, and the Mekong River Delta are densely populated areas and home to over 40 percent of the country's population.
Both have emerged as the most vulnerable areas in the Viet Nam Climate Change Assessment Report. The Report has been compiled by the Institute of Strategy and Policy on Natural Resources and Environment, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment with the support of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
"These two Deltas play an important role in the economic health of the country and in the livelihoods of the people who live there. More than one-third of the Mekong Delta, where 17 million people live and nearly half the country's rice is grown, could be submerged if sea levels rise by one metre. Even under a low emission growth scenario, a fifth of the delta could be flooded," said Dr. Young Woo Park, UNEP's Regional Director for the Asia-Pacific Region.
Viet Nam is considered one of countries in the world which will be most severely impacted by climate change. Over the last 50 years, the country has been experiencing increases in temperatures ranging from 0.05 - 0.20 Celsius per decade, rainfall patterns have also changed, with increasing rainfall in the northern region and decreasing rainfall in the southern region, and sea levels have risen between 2-4 centimeters per decade.
Projections by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicate that Viet Nam will be one of the 12 countries most affected by sea-level rise. With a rise in sea-level of 1-metre, it is anticipated that more than 12 percent of the land will be lost, affecting up to 17 million people. A 2-metre rise in sea level would see land lost increase to 16 percent and could cost up to a third of the country's GDP.
In addition, a sea-level rise could have other important economic impacts along the coastline:
-Expenditures on the maintenance, repair and operation of existing infrastructure are likely to increase;
-Run-off regimes of major rivers where hydropower stations are built would change, affecting water regulation mechanisms and hence the power generation capacity;
-Inundation of lowland areas would increase energy requirements for drainage pumping.
The country has developed a number of mitigation and adaptation policies to address the issue that includes more efficient and economical use of energy, including renewable, the protection of its forest resources, and the introduction of new farming techniques and technologies.
These measures include conserving and restoring existing forests, planting five million hectares of forest on marginal and degraded land, prevention of forest fires and burning of crop residues, the selection of short-duration, high-yield rice varieties, improvement of irrigation-drainage management in rice fields, and research and development of small and micro hydro-power plants.
Copies of the report can be downloaded at: www.roap.unep.org
