Mekong Tipping Point from Henry L. Stimson Center on Vimeo.
August 13, 2010
DPA
Plans to build hydropower dams on the upper Mekong will turn Southeast Asia's longest waterway into a "Chinese river", the regional head of the US-based Stimson Centre has warned.
China has already built four hydropower dams on the upper Mekong River in Yunnan province and plans another four, despite the unknown impact on downstream nations Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Burma and Vietnam.
"Unless all six countries get together and work through this issue, the likelihood is this river will become a Chinese river," said Richard Cronin, who heads the Southeast programme of the Stimson Centre, a US-based think tank that focuses on global security issues.
The centre recently published a paper titled Mekong Tipping Point that highlights the human security and political instability threats posed by the four planned hydropower stations in China and 11 on the lower Mekong.
Past efforts to build hydropower dams were hampered by the Vietnam War in the 1960s and '70s, and thereafter by multilateral bickering.
China, however, has built a cascade of dams on the upper reaches of the river, primarily for electricity generation.
"Ideally, China should stop with the four dams it has built, operate them with transparency, and the dams should not be built on the lower Mekong," Cronin said.
He warned that if China's cascade of dams was built, they could halt up to 70 per cent of the silt that is normally carried by the river to the lower Mekong countries, depriving them of nutrients.
Dams built on the lower Mekong would have an even greater impact on food security.
The Mekong, which flows from the Tibetan Plateau to southern Vietnam, rivals the Amazon in terms of the quantity of fish and aquaculture, and feeds and employs up to 60 million people in the region.
Dams in southern Laos and Cambodia would have an immediate impact on the migratory patterns of fisheries, the study warned.
China's upstream dams became a political issue earlier this year, when the entire region suffered a severe drought. Several non-governmental organisations blamed China for exacerbating the drought by controlling the river's flow.
China refuted the accusations, providing data on its dams' intake and outflow during the period, but it has yet to devise a transparent system by which Southeast Asia is kept appraised of its upriver activities.
China has already built four hydropower dams on the upper Mekong River in Yunnan province and plans another four, despite the unknown impact on downstream nations Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Burma and Vietnam.
"Unless all six countries get together and work through this issue, the likelihood is this river will become a Chinese river," said Richard Cronin, who heads the Southeast programme of the Stimson Centre, a US-based think tank that focuses on global security issues.
The centre recently published a paper titled Mekong Tipping Point that highlights the human security and political instability threats posed by the four planned hydropower stations in China and 11 on the lower Mekong.
Past efforts to build hydropower dams were hampered by the Vietnam War in the 1960s and '70s, and thereafter by multilateral bickering.
China, however, has built a cascade of dams on the upper reaches of the river, primarily for electricity generation.
"Ideally, China should stop with the four dams it has built, operate them with transparency, and the dams should not be built on the lower Mekong," Cronin said.
He warned that if China's cascade of dams was built, they could halt up to 70 per cent of the silt that is normally carried by the river to the lower Mekong countries, depriving them of nutrients.
Dams built on the lower Mekong would have an even greater impact on food security.
The Mekong, which flows from the Tibetan Plateau to southern Vietnam, rivals the Amazon in terms of the quantity of fish and aquaculture, and feeds and employs up to 60 million people in the region.
Dams in southern Laos and Cambodia would have an immediate impact on the migratory patterns of fisheries, the study warned.
China's upstream dams became a political issue earlier this year, when the entire region suffered a severe drought. Several non-governmental organisations blamed China for exacerbating the drought by controlling the river's flow.
China refuted the accusations, providing data on its dams' intake and outflow during the period, but it has yet to devise a transparent system by which Southeast Asia is kept appraised of its upriver activities.
7 comments:
It's just a catastrophe waiting to happen.Furthermore ,the POOR PEOPLE had no voice in the decision making of the leaders ,but pray to the lord almighty to destroy all the dams that were built whether in China or Laos or Cambodia by creating the most powerful earthquake of 9.0 Richter scale or higher to knock down all those dams to ash ,so the natural living thing can go on.Let's pray.
Cambodian Govts must punish those governments officials and local authority for scams and bribe, they allowed illegal business to dig reservoir around Beung Tonles Sap Lake by taken a cut!! i urge PM Hun Sen punish thise Local Authority inorder to teach other crooke outher a lesson...!!!
I urge PM Hun Sen to punish those Local Authority and government officials for allow illegal business man dug a reservoir and taking a cut, punish them inorder to teach them a lesson! also sending a messages to all the crooke out there....
Those provincial government officials they had allowed illegal business people doing these for a long time, hundred hundred of thousand of dollars were bribed within these people and local authority, i'm glad PM Hun Sen sending warning to these crooked people!
Actually, these people should be punish first not just given them a warning, otherwise they will keep doing it again..
I knew this day would come when certain nations think about profits than sustaining human livelyhood. China has over 1.4 billions in populations and the resources of this planet earth is broken apart, thus, China wants to do everything in their own power to be the first to begin the destructions of its neighbors. China having to build one of the greatest dam will put Laos, Thailand, Burma, Vietnam and Cambodia in future chaos. Just imagine the magnetude of its enormous power to which China can get once the dam is completed, but China careless of what will happen to those five nations. Drought will come, short of food will take place at the aftermath, then war will definitely is next to come, because these nations are fighting each other for what is left after China has the ability to control how much water can flow through Mekong. Those fish that has always swim upstream to spawn during their peek season will no longer be accessable, thus what is left in those five nations, fish will do what it can to survive. And when there is lack of fishery business as usual, hence, human survival will also be affected. China, if you still have some human dignity left in you...please stop changing the course of nature and let this water flow as it has been for thousands of years. Do not let Mao Tse Dung's motto "Man must control nature" attitude to destroy what is left for us all. At the end, you are affecting five nations who are depending on these fresh water which is the cycle of nature for thousands of years. I hope China find in her hearth to leave it alone and stop building Dam Projects.
Thank You
X-MEN
Jails those provincial officials or strip down his ass from the current jobs...(position) for a long time Govts should have done something quick, not waited for so long? everything already destroyed??
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