August 2023

Monitoring and community awareness in Cambodia and the Philippines

Forest and landscape restoration play a pivotal role in building resilience to climate change in livelihoods and ecosystems.

In Cambodia and the Philippines, the Asian Development Bank (ADB), with support from the Government of Japan through the Japan Fund for Prosperous and Resilient Asia and the Pacific, is working with ICEM – International Centre for Environmental Management and World Agroforestry (ICRAF), to implement the regional technical assistance project “Investing in Climate Change Adaptation through Agroecological Landscape Restoration: A Nature- Based Solution for Climate Resilience”.

Survey of tree survival in Cambodia

A drone’s eye view of the Restoration Survival Survey getting underway at the Takhes Meanchey site.

In April 2023, the project team joined the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation (MJP), the Forestry Administration and the Ministry of Environment (MOE) on a mission to five restoration demonstration sites in the headwaters of the Sangker River Basin, Battambang Province in Cambodia.

The mission included an assessment of newly planted seedlings, an evaluation of water supply and soil erosion at each site, and the establishment of locally managed plant nurseries. Local community members, forestry officers, rangers, and the MJP field team, collaborated with the project team in field survey and information collection.

Harnessing cutting-edge drone technology, the team employed aerial survey and field observations to assess the growth and survival of seedlings and site conditions. Access to adequate water supply and weeds were found to be the main constraint on planting success. Hydrological patterns were studied and mapped to determine the best locations for water storage infrastructure. Water tanks were designed, and a watering regime defined to ensure adequate supply at each restoration site during the dry season.

The assessment of plantings and management to date […]

Drinking Water Supply Vulnerability in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta

BACKGROUND

The Mekong is one of the world’s great rivers. It is the third-largest river in Asia and the largest river in Southeast Asia. The source of the Mekong is located on the high Tibetan plateau in China. As the river flows downstream, it is joined by tributaries from Myanmar, Lao PDR, Thailand and Cambodia, eventually reaching its delta in Vietnam.

On average, every year about 460 billion cubic metres of water flows from the Mekong into Vietnam’s Mekong Delta Region.[1] However, despite receiving this enormous amount of water every year, the delta’s population of about 20 million people face many challenges in obtaining fresh water that is suitable for drinking and other domestic purposes. There are also concerns that the water insecurity these communities currently face could significantly worsen in the future due to climate change and other developments in the Mekong Basin. The delta is Vietnam’s main agricultural centre, so water insecurities for communities living here could have implications for Vietnam’s food security and economy at a national level.

Due to these concerns, the World Bank, with support from the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery and the Global Water Security and Sanitation Partnership contracted ICEM to undertake a vulnerability assessment for rural water supply systems in the Mekong Delta region under two steps, as discussed below. The first step was to assess the vulnerability of the delta’s rural water supply systems, and the potential effects of climate change and regional development on these vulnerabilities in the future. The second step was to recommend ways to increase the resilience of water supply systems to these vulnerabilities.

STEP 1: VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT

Figure 1: Known rural drinking water systems in […]