Drought drives Vietnam’s Mekong Delta to declare state of emergency

A total of 33,000 hectares of rice fields have been damaged and nearly 70,000 households are suffering from a lack of water

Reasons for the drought and salinity intrusion include a lack of rain, growing water consumption and increased water storage in dams

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Rice fields in the Mekong Delta of Southern Vietnam. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 12:12pm, 7 Mar 2020Updated: 9:57pm, 7 Mar 2020

Vietnam’s prolonged drought, coupled with an extensive build-up of salinity, have driven five provinces in the country’s rice bowl to declare a state of emergency.

“This year’s drought and salinity have been way more devastating than what we saw four years ago,” said Nguyen Thien Phap, head of the water resources department in Tien Giang, one of the provinces that announced the emergency in the Mekong Delta.

The entire area of fruit trees in Tien Giang province, about 80,000 hectares (310 square miles), are at risk, while 24,000 hectares of rice fields will give below-normal yields, said Phap, who added that water usage upstream on the Mekong by nations including China, Laos and Thailand increased the dryness.

The Mekong Delta, which produces more than half the country’s rice, has so far seen a total of 33,000 hectares of rice fields damaged and nearly 70,000 households suffer from lack of water, Vietnam National Television reported on Friday, citing the latest data from the country’s department of water resources.

Construction in 2012 of the controversial Xayaburi dam in Laos, which opponents say adversely affects communities along the Mekong and the biodiversity of the river. Photo: EPA

Salinity of four grams a litre will continue to spread in the Delta, affecting as much as 110 kilometres in some major estuaries this month, according to a report by the Southern Institute of Water Resources Research in Ho Chi Minh City. That is three to five kilometres more than in the same period in 2016.

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