Rivers for Life and Livelihoods: Classification of River Health on the Salween and Irrawaddy Rivers

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Project Description

The Myanmar Healthy Rivers Initiative (MHRI) was developed to assess and protect the ecological health of Myanmar’s two largest rivers—the Salween and Ayeyarwady—amid rapid socio-economic transformation. These rivers are lifelines for millions of people and ecosystems, but increasing development pressures and evolving stakeholder needs are reshaping how they are used and managed. The initiative focuses on generating evidence and building local capacity to understand and respond to these changes. Drawing on regional and global experiences with River Health Frameworks (RHF), MHRI is tailored to Myanmar’s context where conventional monitoring data is limited.

Objectives, Activities and Results

The initiative aims to improve understanding of river health and stakeholder values in data-poor contexts by applying innovative methods such as remote sensing and citizen science. It empowers a broad spectrum of stakeholders—from government agencies to riverine communities—to engage in river development planning based on scientific evidence. ICEM and IWMI jointly developed two “State of Knowledge” papers for the Salween and Ayeyarwady rivers, synthesizing existing knowledge on river health, current usage, and future threats. These foundational assessments support more informed trade-offs and decision-making for sustainable river management in Myanmar.

client:

AusAID,CGIAR,IWMI,Oxfam International

LOCATION:

Myanmar

TIME:

April 2015

to October 2017

Publications

As part of the initiative, ICEM and IWMI has jointly produced two State of Knowledge papers, one on the Salween River and one on the Ayeyarwady River, to understand the impact of development on the two rivers, and on the livelihoods and biodiversity they support. The papers review what is known about river health in the two basins, including both the current state and uses of the rivers and their catchments, and issues likely to drive change in the near future.

Posters

This poster highlights the characteristics of a healthy river and highlights how the project will use monitoring—from the riverbank and from space—to assess the health of the Irrawaddy and Salween river basins. Download a high resolution version of the poster.
As part of the Myanmar Healthy Rivers Initiative, and displayed at the 2017 Greater Mekong Forum on Water, Food and Energy in Yangon, Myanmar. The display included a presentation of results of a geomorphological survey of the Ayeyarwady and Thanlwin rivers, maps on water quality and flow stress in the two river basins and a map of key fish areas for the Ayeyarwady River basin.
Six posters on community river health monitoring were developed to display community-based, river health monitoring techniques for informed and inclusive decision-making for the future management of Myanmar’s key river. The six riparian villages that form part of the project, three located along the Ayeyarwady River and three along the Thanlwin River, are represented in the poster series. Download the Community based river health monitoring poster series