Understanding Floods in the Mekong Delta, Video

Video © GIZ

Flooding is a way of life in the Mekong Delta River. The locals are accustomed to the flood which regularly happens in the monsoon season. The sediment carried by the floods enrich the farmland with nutrients and provide the moisture needed to grow vast fields of rice. The Mekong Delta is home to 20% of Vietnam’s population and is the country’s third largest industrial region. It provides half of the country’s rice and more than half of the fruit and seafood production.

Nonetheless, the Mekong Delta regions is vulnerable to climate change and flood related disasters. Each year about half of the Delta is flooded by overflow of 1 to 3 meters in depth. The vulnerability to flooding thus creates a large negative impact on the economic development not only of the region, but also of the Vietnam as a whole.

To address the challenges of climate change impacts and floods in the Mekong delta, SECO has contributed EUR 5 million to the “Mekong Urban flood proofing and drainage project”. This project is implemented by “Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit” (GIZ) between 2017 – 2019 in cooperation with the Vietnamese Ministry of Construction and three selected cities in the Mekong Delta: Long Xuyên, Rạch Giá and Cà Mau. The project has:

• promoted integrated flood proofing solutions in urban infrastructure planning
• influenced national flood proofing regulation
• developed the basis to include mitigation measures for climate change in integrated urban and infrastructure planning
• and increased the cities preparedness and responsiveness to flooding and climate change through early warning systems.