5. Overview of Measures and Assessment of Capacity for Flood Prevention and Drought Relief

This Chapter introduces the structural and non-structural measures for flood prevention and drought relief in every country of the Mekong River Basin (MRB), and evaluates the capacities for flood prevention and drought relief to these countries. In this chapter, Some specific situations (including location, quantity and scale) of the flood prevention engineering, such as reservoirs, dikes, sluices, pumps, flood storage and detention areas etc., are introduced. The non-structural measures for flood control and disaster reduction of Mekong River Commission and other countries in the basin are introduced from the aspects of hydrological monitoring, prediction, early warning, organization and management system, emergency response, etc. The flood prevention capacity of each country in the MRB and the overall flood control capacity of the MRB are evaluated from the aspects of the per capita reservoir capacity of each country in the basin, and the flood discharge capacity of the main stream of the Mekong River, etc. In this chapter, the drought relief capacity is assessed from an analysis of the available structural and non-structural measures in the MRB using multiple disaster survey data. Specifically, three key indicators (including reservoir irrigation pattern, the proportion of irrigation area, per capita GDP) are employed to assess the water project capacity, economic strength, and drought prevention and disaster reduction response capability. Results show that the flood and drought relief capacity is mostly dependent on the support capacity from the national economy and the water conservancy project. From the national view, the flood and drought relief capacity differs by countries. Comparing with other countries, the Thailand and Viet Nam are of better capacity in response to flood and drought disasters, attributing to the enough economic investment in emergency response system and the relatively completed flood prevention and irrigation project system. In contrast, the flood prevention and irrigation project and its spatial coverage in other countries (Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar) are still in infancy, resulting in the relatively poor flood prevention and drought-coping capacity. From the basin perspective, the integrated flood prevention and drought relief capacity is weak, due to the lack of the Upper-Lower coordination scheme. This suggests the countries in the Mekong River Basin should further strengthen the coordination and communication to improve the integrated water resource emergency management, and thus explore the potential flood prevention and drought relief capacity at the basin-scale.