Progress Report 2006

---

The Water Utilisation Programme

 The six-year Water Utilisation Programme aims to improve water management and ensure mutual beneficial water use management in the Lower Mekong River Basin while maintaining its ecological balance. In order to accomplish these objectives, the Water Utilisation Programme has created an integrated knowledge base, providing data and decision support, as well as a comprehensive hydrological modelling package. These have served as the basis for the creation of a set of procedures governing water use. To date four of these procedures for water use have been agreed upon by the four governments of the Lower Mekong Basin.

In addition, the implementation of the programme has improved the institutional capacity of the MRC, the National Mekong Committees and national line agencies.

The MRCS is the implementing agency of the WUP. A WUP Management Team (WMT) leads and coordinates programme implementation. Each NMC has established a permanent national WUP unit, responsible for coordination of national participation and WUP implementation at the national level.

The WMT organises and supervises three Working Groups:

Working Group 1 – Basin modelling and knowledge base;
Working Group 2 – Environmental and transboundary analysis; and
Working Group 3 – Procedures formulation.

The current phase of the WUP was originally scheduled to end in 2006, but has been extended until 2007 to complete its work and to develop a successor project funded by the Global Environment Facility through the World Bank. Formulation of this new programme will be undertaken through national and regional consultations following advice of the MRC Joint Committee throughout 2007.

In 2006 Council Members from the four Member States signed off the Procedures for Maintenance of Flows on the Mainstream (PMFM) on 22 June 2006, in Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam. The flow procedures are required under the provisions of the 1995 Mekong Agreement on the Cooperation for the Sustainable Development of the Mekong River Basin, which formed the Mekong River Commission.

The Agreement requires the member states to cooperate in the maintenance of:

• acceptable minimum monthly flows in the dry season,
• acceptable natural reverse flow of the Tonle Sap during the wet season; and
• prevention of peak flows greater than occur naturally.

The PMFM clarify these provisions of the Mekong Agreement through further defining objectives, principles and scope of their application as well as the roles and responsibilities of the various parties required for their implementation, including the MRC Council, the MRC Joint Committee, the National Mekong Committees and the MRC Secretariat.

Most notably the Procedures delegate the responsibility to prepare Technical Guidelines for their implementation to the members of the Joint Committee. These Technical Guidelines will define in concrete terms the actual flow and level values and the location of the Mekong mainstream hydrological stations which will be used to monitor these flows and levels. Preparation of these guidelines is now underway.

In 2006 the Decision Support Framework (DSF) modelling team actively supported the preparation of the revised Technical Guidelines for Implementation of the PMFM based on 1) the newly calibrated models, 2) the proposals to simplify and improve the presentation based on experiences/understanding of the requirements gained during the past year, and 3) the insights gained under its Integrated Basin Flow Management (IBFM) work.

Drafting of the final set of procedures – the Procedures for Water Quality (PWQ) – has also been finalised and it is expected these will be signed in early 2007.

The DSF developed under the WUP is a powerful suite of modelling tools used to undertake its scenario development work. In 2006 new contracts were signed for continued improvements on the DSF. Two DSF maintenance contracts were also approved, thus enabling urgent bug-fixing and other maintenance activities to be carried out. The Integrated Quality and Quantity Model maintenance contract is now also under implementation.

Progress was made in moving forward with the selection and implementation of national case studies (two from each NMC) providing an opportunity for the modelling teams in the MRCS and the NMCs to apply the DSF and other models to real water resource management issues in the member countries.

A programme of DSF modelling training was developed in association with experts from the National Institute for Rural Engineering of Japan and the World Bank Institute (WBI). This programme was executed in May and June directed mainly at the Lao National Mekong Committee and the Cambodia National Mekong Committee and with the support of the modelling team, and due to its success, and continued funding available through the WBI, will likely be continued in 2006/2007.

The WUP-FIN team continued the Phase 2 model set-ups, calibration, validation and application. In addition, a more active participation in the Environment Programme-driven IBFM Phase 3 activities is being planned.

The results of the Flow Regime Impacts Workshop (held on 7- 11 November 2005) were synthesised by the Integrated Basin Flow Management Team with IBFM Report No. 8 finalised in 2006. This report represents an important milestone in IBFM 2 activities. An overview of the conclusions was presented to the Members of the Joint Committee during the Preparatory Meeting for the Twenty-Third Meeting (April 2006). WUP proceeded with further national consultations and Technical Reporting Group meetings including preparation of revised Technical Guidelines for Implementation of the PMFM, which constituted completion of IBFM Phase 2 activities. The Environment Programme will now move forward with detailed research and stakeholder consultation under IBFM Phase 3.

The formulation of the MRC Drought Management Programme was started in May and was presented for consideration by Council in December 2006, where it was approved as a basis to solicit donor funding.

The WUP supported execution of a GEF2 Scoping Mission by two international consultants during May 2006 to assess whether or not the member countries see a need to move to a new phase of GEF support as a follow-up to the WUP as it neared completion in 2006. The study concluded that a second project could be justified, but more discussion was needed on how the project would be designed. The GEF2 project concept was further developed in consultation with the World Bank and the Member States, and approved by the Council at its meeting in December 2006.

WUP unit members participated in review and comment on the formulation of three regional studies being promoted under Mekong Water Resources Partnership Programme by the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.

The Joint Committee, at its 23rd Meeting in April 2006 agreed to include the WUP with the Basin Development Plan Programme under the new Planning Division. This reorganisation was endorsed by the World Bank during the May 2006 supervision mission.

The WUP is a GEF-funded project managed by the World Bank and implemented by MRC. It is also funded by the Government of Finland.