Managing flood risks in the Mekong Delta: How to address emerging challenges under climate change and socioeconomic developments

Climate change and accelerating socioeconomic developments increasingly challenge flood-risk management in the Vietnamese Mekong River Delta—a typical large, economically dynamic and highly vulnerable delta. This study identifies and addresses the emerging challenges for flood-risk management. Furthermore, we identify and analyse response solutions, focusing on meaningful configurations of the individual solutions and how they can be tailored to specific challenges using expert surveys, content analysis techniques and statistical inferences. Our findings show that the challenges for flood-risk management are diverse, but critical challenges predominantly arise from the current governance and institutional settings. The top-three challenges include weak collaboration, conflicting management objectives and low responsiveness to new issues. We identified 114 reported solutions and developed six flood management strategies that are tailored to specific challenges. We conclude that the current technology-centric flood management approach is insufficient given the rapid socioecological changes. This approach therefore should be adapted towards a more balanced management configuration where technical and infrastructural measures are combined with institutional and governance resolutions. Insights from this study contribute to the emerging repertoire of contemporary flood management solutions, especially through their configurations and tailoring to specific challenges.     

Environmental impact assessment for Xiaolangdi Yellow River multi-purpose economic-cumenvironmental improvement project

Summary The Yellow River is renowned for its life-endangering floods, a problem augmented by the continuous heavy siltation of its lower flood plain. Major dam and reservoir projects have both positive and negative environmental impacts, and their construction requires careful environmental consideration. This paper outlines the key findings of environmental impact assessment reports related to the Xiaolangdi Yellow River dam/reservoir project. The authors conclude that the project, as planned, should provide an optimal mix of both economic and environmental benefits.This paper is modified from a presentation given to the 1993 Annual Meeting of the International Association for Impact Assessment (IAIA) in Shanghai, China.     

Arsenic in drinking water and mortality in the Southern Great Plain,Hungary

Arsenic distribution has been found in drinking waters. A connection between arsenic and other constituents of water was determined. Close positive correlation was found between arsenic and humic substances over most of the study area. In two smaller areas, there was no correlation between arsenic and humic substances. In these waters, the arsenic distribution is not controlled by organic matter, but by other factors which need further investigations.Examination of mortality in the populations consuming water containing levels of arsenic above and below that permitted did not show any significant differences in standardised mortality ratio (SMR) from all causes of death for both male and female. The SMR from the main causes of death — diseases of the circulatory system and neoplasms — shows controversial results for males and females.