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China damned over floods
By Brian McCartan
Asia Times Online. Aug 23, 2008
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/JH23Ae02.html
CHIANG MAI - As Mekong River floodwaters in Laos and Thailand recede,
indignation with China for its lack of transparency on upstream dam
developments is on the rise. China has recently pursued a friendly
policy of economic integration with Southeast Asian neighbors but in
relation to Mekong River development it has taken what many see as a
covetous and less than neighborly approach.
Flood waters in recent days inundated parts of Luang Prabang and
Vientiane provinces in Laos and at least seven northern provinces in
Thailand. The flooding was widely reportedly the worst in a century
for some areas, with river levels reaching a high of 13.7 meters on
August 14. Previous record high floods occurred in 1966, when river
levels reached 12.4 meters.
Thailand has estimated damages at around 220 million baht (US$6.48
million), while the Vientiane Times, a state-controlled Lao newspaper,
cited an unofficial government report that the floods would cost Luang
Prabang province alone some 100 billion kip (US$11.6 million). Those
figures may only be provisional, as flood waters in the Mekong Delta
have already reached critical levels and Vietnamese forecasters have
predicted more flooding before the end of the rainy season.
The larger cost has been diplomatic, as downstream neighbors suspect
rightly or wrongly that Chinese dams were primarily responsible for
the flooding. From the hard-hit Chiang Saen and Chiang Khong districts
of Thailand's northern Chiang Rai province to its eastern Mukdahan
province, many Thais believe waters released from the reservoirs of
three upstream Chinese dams swelled the runoff from heavy rainfalls.
They also blame China's recent blasting and dredging of upstream river
rapids to make the river navigable for large cargo vessels for rising
water levels.
That may or may not be the case, but China's lack of transparency is
fueling suspicions. The Mekong River Commission (MRC), a multinational
grouping made up of Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam responsible
for sustainable development and water resource management of the
Mekong, said in a statement that the high water levels were the result
of above average rainfall and not the result of upstream Chinese dams
opening sluice gates. The situation was compounded by tropical storm
Kammuri, which hit the region between August 8 and 10, the statement
said.
The MRC also noted that just half of the flood waters in Vientiane
originated in China with the rest from Mekong tributaries, namely the
Nam Ou and Nam Khan rivers. It concluded, "The current water levels
are entirely the result of the meteorological and hydrological
conditions and were not caused by water release from presently
operating Chinese dams which have storage areas far too small to
affect the flood hydrology of the Mekong," the statement said.
That view was supported by Thailand's Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej
and the Thai Water Resources Department, which oversees Mekong water
flows and Lao government officials also said Chinese dams are not at
fault. Heavy rains had lashed Myanmar and Vietnam - lending credence
to the nation's views - resulting in severe flooding that killed at
least 130 in northern Vietnam and forced thousands from their homes in
both countries.
But the Thai People's Network on the Mekong, a grouping of several
Thai environmental organizations, openly rejected the MRC's reasoning
for the floods in an August 16 statement, calling for China to free up
information on its dams. There also appears to be lingering doubts
among some top government officials.
Thai Deputy Interior Minister Prasong Kositanond said on Wednesday
that officials were studying the floods and that China may be asked to
provide future warnings on the timings and volumes of water released
by the dams. He noted that without the cooperation of China,
Thailand's northeastern regions could face more severe flooding. Even
the MRC in Thailand, in contradiction to the statement from the
organization's headquarters, has said it will ask the Thai Foreign
Ministry for help in requesting more information from China about its
dams.
No dam evidence
China has remained reluctant to reveal information about its dams,
including its own environmental and hydrological studies of their
impact. This lack of transparency has continued despite heavy
criticism from environmental groups and official pleas from Southeast
Asian neighbors seeking more information.
Thai Water Resource Department deputy head, Thanade Dawasuwan,
recently told the Bangkok Post that his department actually has scant
information on the Chinese dams. Thailand's MRC coordinator, Burachat
Buasuwan, told the same newspaper that Chinese officials only provide
information on water discharges in the rainy season. The MRC, he
claimed, had made requests for information from Chinese officials in
the past, but had yet to receive replies.
China has so far completed three dams across the upper Mekong - the
Manwan in 1993, the Dachaoshan in 2002 and the Jinghong in June of
this year. The three dams have respective storage capacities of 920
million, 890 million and 1.2 billion cubic meters, meaning a total of
over 3 billion cubic meters of reservoir. This is enough,
environmentalists say, to significantly influence water flows on the
upper Mekong. Chinese officials have countered that since only 18% of
the Mekong's flow originates in its areas, the dams will not have an
effect on the volume of water flowing downstream.
China's grand vision for the Mekong is to build up to fifteen power-
generating dams on its upper reaches to fuel economic growth in its
laggard southwestern territories. The Xiaowan dam, the world's tallest
at 292 meters, is slated for completion on the upper Mekong in 2013.
Scheduled to generate over 4,000 megawatts of electricity, that
particular hydropower dam has downstream Southeast Asia concerned
about the massive reservoir the dam is expected to create and its
anticipated impact on river water levels. Chinese officials have said
the 190 square kilometer reservoir will reduce the amount of water
flowing downward by 17% during flood seasons and increase the flow by
40% in dry seasons.
What is certain is that there have been ecological and hydrological
changes in the Mekong River since the construction of the Chinese
dams, and more recently with the dynamiting of river rapids. Locals in
Chiang Khong, Thailand, the closest major town of the MRC member
countries to China, say that there is a noticeable rise in the river
level when the water gates are opened on China's dams.
Environmentalists say the dams have also affected the river's seasonal
flows and caused the destruction of river islets. They also blame
water blockages due to dam construction for unexpected and dangerous
rapid rises and falls in downstream flows.
Until recently the main concern about the dams centered more on the
lack of water flowing down the river. For example, the dams were
criticized for exacerbating a drought in 2004 that left ships stranded
mid-river and damaged crops and fishing in downstream nations. Halts
in river flows for up to five days at a time due to Chinese dam
construction inhibited trade, with angry cargo ship owners claiming
journeys that used to take days instead took weeks.
China-first policy
The MRC said in 2004 that the Chinese dams had exacerbated the drought
and sent an official letter to Beijing demanding information on the
Chinese dams. In a seeming about turn, then-MRC chief executive
officer Oliver Cogels wrote a letter to the Bangkok Post on January 9,
2007, claiming the impact of the Chinese dams was exaggerated in
public opinion and not a factor in the drought affecting downstream
countries.
He also noted, echoing Beijing's line, that because the Chinese dams
are for power generation and not for irrigation, they do not hold
water, but instead regulate flows, increasing them in the dry season
and reducing them in the rainy season. Indeed China's dams may not be
directly culpable for either the flooding or drought, but the lack of
transparency has stoked downstream fears and anger among its southern
neighbors and environmental groups.
China's unwillingness to allow independent scientific studies on its
dams' impacts makes it difficult to conclusively determine what impact
they have had on water levels. Even within China there is very little
public discourse on the dams, in part because the issue is treated as
a matter of national security.
Beijing has made clear its stance that since it is developing the
Mekong on Chinese soil, it is not responsible for downstream impacts.
Appeals to China by non-governmental organizations to compensate
people living downstream whose farming or fishing livelihoods have
allegedly been impacted by the recent changes in the river have been
scornfully rebuffed.
China's lack of cooperation and responsibility is seemingly at odds
with its broader soft power policy of forging greater economic
integration with Southeast Asia, including through preferential free
trade agreements and generous infrastructure loans. Seen from
Beijing's point of view, its participation in the Greater Mekong
Subregion is less about an altruistic desire to see its southern
neighbors develop and more about gaining access to export markets for
its industrial and agricultural goods and securing a strategic,
alternative passage for fuel and other imports for its inland
industries.
China is not a member of the MRC and critics say that without
Beijing's participation the grouping is powerless to accomplish
organizational goals related to sustainable development on the Mekong.
If China were to join, it would have to conform to various mandatory
standards and come under pressure to accept water management norms
that are less harmful to downstream communities, a prospect it clearly
wants to avoid.
The MRC has however recently incorporated China and Myanmar to some
extent, as non-member, dialogue partners. While the MRC's most
northerly monitoring station is in Chiang Saen, Thailand, in 2002 it
convinced China to commit to exchanging some information from two of
its monitoring stations, including the Jinghong station located below
its three standing dams. Flood forecasting first became an issue after
floods in 2000 killed some 800 people in the Mekong Delta. In 2005,
China agreed to hold technical discussions with the MRC, including
flood management and alleviation.
Last year, Beijing also agreed to begin supplying the MRC with 24-hour
water level and 12-hour rainfall data for flood forecasts in return
for monthly flow data from MRC stations on the lower Mekong. However
the incentives for China to become a full-fledged member of the MRC
are still few and far between. As the Mekong's most upstream nation,
it is geographically in a position of power. And with its growing
hunger for new and alternative energy sources to imported oil, it will
likely remain loathe to enter into a multilateral mechanism which may
attempt to put a brake on its ambitious dam building program.
For China, the Mekong is now viewed more as a potential source of
energy rather than a trade artery, as the river has been quickly
supplanted by a more efficient network of roads leading south from
China's Yunnan province into Southeast Asia. The newly completed Route
3 in Laos that connects Yunnan with northern Thailand through Laos
means trucks can complete a trade journey in hours which used to take
days by river.
Once a bridge is completed across the Mekong between the northern Thai
town of Chiang Khong and Laos' Huay Xai, where Route 3 currently
terminates, Yunnan's goods will have direct access to Southeast Asian
markets, and perhaps more importantly, to seaports on the Gulf of
Thailand and the Andaman Sea. Close relations with military-ruled
Myanmar have already provided China with another southern trade route,
with a soon to be upgraded port at Sittwe on the Indian Ocean.
Of course cross-border river issues pose diplomatic problems and
challenges in many regions of the world. Although a Law of the Sea
treaty exists to govern disputes on the world's oceans, there is no
comparable global law for rivers to mediate disputes over water
resources. Until such a mechanism exists, and more importantly until
China agrees to a more multilateral approach to managing the Mekong,
the issue will remain a contentious one with its Southeast Asian
neighbors while life for people living along the river's shifting
banks will remain highly uncertain.
Brian McCartan is a Chiang Mai-based freelance journalist. |
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