News and Events
Working with fisherwomen in Xuan Thuy National Park
Every day, hundreds of local fisherwomen enter the mangrove forest in Xuan Thuy National Park to collect shells, mollusks, crabs, and other aquatic products. Although the law prohibits any kind of resource extraction in the core zone, the poor women who depend on these natural resources have no other choice. Up to six hours a day, they wade through the mud and water and end up earning less than US$3 a day. The overexploitation of aquatic products has resulted in increased scarcity and growing competition between the fisherwomen. …
26 Apr 2013 | Article
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Where have the sea turtles gone?
“Sea turtles don’t come to nest on our beach anymore!” said Mr. Minh, a member of Sea Turtle Nesting Beach Protection, a volunteer network in Quang Tri Province. Despite the participation of nearly 3,500 local residents and school children in beach protection, a recent survey found that, since 2007, no marine turtle nests have been recorded in Quang Tri, Quang Nam, and Quang Ngai Provinces and the very few nests that remain in Binh Dinh Province are on off-shore islands. Meanwhile, according to a 2009 report by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), 1,000 mature turtles a year are killed accidentally by fishermen as “by-catch”. …
26 Apr 2013 | Article
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Soc Trang community prepares to adapt to climate change
The Mekong Delta is one of the parts of the world projected to be most impacted by sea level rise. And within the delta, the coastal districts of Soc Trang Province are considered particularly vulnerable because of the very flat topography. Local people are already observing higher high tides and stronger wave action that break the unconsolidated earth dike that protects them from the sea. The EU-funded project Building Coastal Resilience (BCR) is working in Mo O, a small village in Trung Binh Commune to build local capacity to address this threat. …
25 Apr 2013 | Article
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Mekong Days in Washington
The Mekong Region is a massive ecosystem that is the lifeline for more than 60 million people across six countries. In the Lower Mekong Basin, it provides fish to more people than any other river in the world. More than 150 hydropower dams are currently planned, under construction, or commissioned for the Mekong and its tributaries. If constructed, the dams will radically alter the basin’s hydrology, ecology and, consequently, the lives of millions who depend upon it. How can these seemingly opposite demands be met?
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22 Mar 2013 | Article
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Coastal defense: New thinking needed
A major risk with the current obsession with climate change adaptation is in fact maladaptation: expensive solutions to problems that may never emerge or which themselves create new problems (the famous law of unintended consequences). This is evident in Vietnam where in 2009 the prime minister approved a plan to build concrete sea dikes (replacing the existing dirt dikes), at a cost of US$3 million per kilometer, along the entire coastline. This was motivated in part by a World Bank study that showed that most of the Mekong Delta will be flooded when sea level rises by 1 meter as it is predicted to do sometime between 2050 and 2100. A study by an academic at Can Tho University of the costs and benefits of concrete sea dikes around the Mekong Delta concluded that these were a good idea (http://www.eepsea.net/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=434:adaptation-to-sea-level-rise-in-the-vietnamese-mekong-river-delta-should-a-sea-dike-be-built?&Itemid=192). The assumptions on which the study is based are highly selective, however. For example, it assumes that rice and freshwater shrimp are the highest value land uses in the coastal zone, ignoring the benefits of saltwater aquaculture and changing market demands over time. … | Vietnamese
08 Mar 2013 | Article
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Buddhism and mangroves in Tien Giang Province
On January 19, 2013, MFF staff participated in two events in Tien Giang Province: an award ceremony for paintings of mangroves; and a visit to a mangrove plantation on Loi Quan Island. Both events were organized by MFF grantee Phu Thoi Pagoda. … | Vietnamese
22 Feb 2013 | News story
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Lam Binh Community sends strong message to poachers
Once bitten, twice shy. Or perhaps, in this case the phrase should be ‘once stung, twice shy’. That is the lesson SOS grantee, People Resources and Conservation Foundation, hopes poachers will take from a recent successful ‘sting’ operation carried out in Lam Binh, a remote mountainous karst region in northern Vietnam.
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08 Feb 2013 | News story
After Xayaburi, it's time for some 'hydro-diplomacy'
The groundbreaking ceremony for the Xayaburi dam in Laos on Nov 7 marked the symbolic end to a long and contentious international campaign to delay the dam's construction until further studies into its potential trans-boundary impacts were complete. … | Vietnamese
05 Feb 2013 | News story
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Saving Saola from snares
An initiative created by the Saola Working Group of IUCN's Species Survival Commission (SSC) and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Greater Mekong Programme has removed and destroyed 26,651 snares from the forests of Viet Nam and Laos that are home to the rare and elusive Saola. …
25 Jan 2013 | News story
IUCN presented awards to winners of Goethe-Institut' SEADocs
SEADocs – The Southeast Asian Student Documentary Award is a competition to encourage the art of documentary filmmaking in the region as a platform to engage with pressing social and environmental issues. …
01 Jan 2013 | Event
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