Asian Pacific FRIEND-WATER is one of the eight FRIEND programs of the UNESCO International Hydrological Program and gather 8 countries of the region.
The program aims to enhance research collaboration between the countries in Asian Pacific region (and with other regions) in the field of hydrology and related sciences, within several major research themes in the area.
The research themes are:
The Red River (Vietnam and China) is a good example of a South-East Asian river system, strongly affected by climate and human activities. The proposed work aims to calculate the carbon fluxes and carbon emission from the Red River, which concern to the global warming. The SENEQUE/Riverstrahler model which allows to relate the water quality and carbon transfers in the drainage network to the constraints resulting from human activity and natural conditions in the watershed can be applied for different scenarios of the past, present situations and possible future changes in the 2050s horizon for the whole Red River basin.
The aquatic environment of large cities in Asia is faced with many pollution problems as a result of the rapid economic development of the past decades. Emerging pollutants are any synthetic or naturally-occurring chemicals that are not monitored or regulated in the environment and that have known or suspected adverse impacts on ecosystem and human health. The proposed project will develop a dataset of the emerging pollutants including persistent organic pollutants (POP), micro/macroplastics, antibiotics and cyanotoxins in the aquatic ecosystems of seven large cities (Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh, Beijing, Singapore, Seoul, Bangkok, Phnom Penh) in East and Southeast Asia. The developed dataset of emerging pollutants in the region, will then be used to evaluate the potential risks to ecosystem and human health in order to propose better management practices for their disposal in large cities. The results will provide a scientific basis for the improvement of regional scale management of water resources. Studies on emerging pollutants are urgently needed for the definition of the conditions necessary for sustainable development in East and Southeast Asia.
The objectives are to determine the impacts of human activities and climate change on the abilities of these mangrove systems to serve as carbon and nutrient sink, and the potential of these mangroves facing deterioration in East and Southeast Asia. Trends of TOC, TN, TP and pollutants from past to present will indicate whether these mangroves tend to accumulate carbon and nutrients. The sediment accumulation rates of these mangroves will be compared to the rates of sea level rise to determine whether the mangroves are facing threats of being submerged. The degree of mangrove deterioration will be further investigated by determination of areal changes of these mangrove systems by remote sensing. Results will provide important information for policy makers to maintain the sustainability of the fragile mangrove ecosystems.
INOWASIA is an Erasmus + Capacity Building Higher Education project that promotes a joint action of 11 organisations across 5 countries (Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, France and Spain) to train a new generation of water professionals in Southeast Asia.
CONSEA is developped to ensure Biodiversity Conservation & Environmental sustainability around the Mekong basin through the development of an effective education program at the Master and PhD levels as a collaborative effort between SEA countries (Cambodia and Vietnam) and Europe.
WANASEA Project aims to enhance the scientific cooperation between researchers, PhD students and non-academic stakeholders in the field of Water and Natural Resources Management (WNRM) in South-East Asia. The project also contributes to build sustainable partnerships between some of the leading universities in South-East Asia and some renowned European universities in EU. Over the three years of the project, various training sessions and exchange of good practices are organized. These activities must lead to improve Master and PhD programmes of the Asian partner institutions by developing innovative teaching methods and research practices. Moreover, a network on WNRM including researchers, PhD students and non-academic stakeholders must emerge to foster joint research activities and also to raise the awareness about current trans-boundary issues in the Greater Mekong Sub-region.
The Working Group II (WGII) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) describes the vulnerability and exposure of human and natural systems, the observed impacts and future risks of climate change, and the potential for and limits to adaptation (IPCC, 2014). One of the key messages is that climate change is a challenge in managing risks. Three points that are important are (1) global annual economic losses for additional temperature increases of up to 2 degrees are between 0.2 and 2.0% of income, (2) co-benefits, synergies, and trade-offs exist between mitigation and adaptation and among different adaptation responses, and (3) available strategies and actions can increase resilience across a range of possible future climate while helping to improve human health, livelihoods, social and economic well-being and environmental quality.
Generally, toward incorporation of adaptation to climate change into national master plans, there are three challenges. First is that adaptation to climate change is still in the research and development process. This is because the quantitative estimation of adaptation is limited. Second is that adaptation should have diversities considering local characteristics. Especially, case studies of adaptation to climate change considering local characteristics in the middle income countries and the developing counties are limited and crucial. Third is that adaptation to climate change should be integrated with governmental strategies of existing sectors such as disaster risk management, integrated water resources management and rural development. Furthermore, instead of individual adaptation to climate change, the well-balanced portfolio of various adaptations to climate change should be designed.
Droughts impact lives and livelihoods around the world, particularly in those regions with limited resilience to extreme events. In South-East Asia (SEA), pressures from climate and land use change, increasing populations and development impact water resources, even in Thailand which is considered to be one of the wealthier countries in the region.
Regional coordinator AP-FRIEND:
Dr. Thi Phuong Quynh Le - Researcher at Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology
Contact : quynhltp@gmail.com
