Vietnam needs $30 bln for climate change response — Talk Vietnam

Vietnam needs $30 bln for climate change response

May 24, 2015

Vietnam needs a total of 30 billion USD for climate change response through green growth, said a report released at a meeting in Hanoi on May 21.

Climate change related disasters have caused annual average cost in damages of 2-6 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), according to the Climate Public Expenditure and Investment Review announced by the Ministry of Planning and Investment under the support of the World Bank (WB) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).



The report showed that the Vietnamese Government spent a limited amount of its own resources for climate change mitigation, including low-carbon energy generation (about 4 billion VND equal to 183,000 USD) and energy efficiency measures (about 76 billion VND equal to 348,000 USD).

In the meantime, the report said about 88 percent of the total budget for climate-change response during 2010-13 (14.9 trillion VND) was spent for direct activities, such as building infrastructure, building dykes to protect coasts and afforesting.

Nine percent was directed towards science and technology development and three percent for making policies and management activities related to climate-change response.

In addition, experts said that although the Government dedicated a significant amount of spending on climate change activities as well as established political agenda through climate change and green growth strategies, the agenda had not realised its full potential, shortcoming were found – and some important activities remained underfunded.

Pham Hoang Mai, Director General of the ministry’s Science, Education, Natural Resources and Environment Department, one of authors of the report, said that to integrate climate change into the budget, the country needed to introduce a climate budget.

In the long term, this budget could become a rolling programme based on an annually updated medium-term fiscal framework, he said.

Mai also said an important task would be to establish a strategic direction for climate-change response plans and expenditure in the social-economic development plan 2016-20.

Victoria Kwakwa, the World Bank Country Director for Vietnam, said that mainstreaming climate change into the budget would strengthen Vietnam’s resilience against the impacts of a warming world, make communities less vulnerable, and tackle the emissions challenge as Vietnam continued its journey toward a greener and prosperous future.

According to experts, Vietnam’s greenhouse gas emissions and overall carbon intensity have significantly increased as a result of the economic expansion.

Statistics from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment showed that greenhouse gas emissions rose from 103.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide to 246.8 million of tonnes between 1994 and 2010.

Thus, the report helped accelerate the country’s transition to a low-carbon economy, said Louise Chamberlain, Country Director for the United Nations Development Programme.

VNA

Climate change 92% of Mekong Delta under water in 2100?

Climate change could spell doom for delta

VietNamNet Bridge – Average temperatures in northern central Viet Nam can rise by 3.5 degrees centigrade and dry season rainfall reduce by 30 per cent by 2100, according to a new climate change report prepared by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.

The new predictions are based on updated data collected from 200 meteorological stations and satellites. It paints a worse scenario than an earlier report in 2009 which estimated average temperature increase at 2.8 degrees centigrade and rainfall reduction at 18 per cent.

In the new version, by 2100, hot days with temperatures over 35 degrees centigrade would double in comparison with now.

Rainfall would raise 2-7 per cent in the rainy season but drop significantly during dry season.

The report divides climate change impacts into three categories: low, medium and high, depending on the level of emissions and socio-economic development.

At the medium level, if the sea water rises by 1m, around 2.5 per cent of land area in central coastal provinces, 10 per cent of the Hong River Delta, 20 per cent of HCM City and 39 per cent of the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta would be inundated.

Four per cent of the railway system, nine per cent of highways and 12 per cent of provincial roads would be suffered.

If emissions increased at higher levels in Viet Nam and the world, the sea levels are expected to rise by 2m, in which case the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta would virtually cease to exit with 92 per cent under water.

The Hong River Delta and HCM City would lose 30 and 36 per cent of their land respectively.

The scenarios sketched in the report are expected to inform plans formulated to tackle climate change by concerned ministries and departments.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News

Vietnam ranks climate change as high priority | Look At Vietnam - Vietnam news daily update

 Ed note: Seems like most countries are concerned about climate change. Everyone expect the Republican in the United States.  This one is for you John McCain.

LookAtVietnam - Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai told a workshop in Hanoi on March 4 that the annual budget for climate change had reached trillions of Vietnamese dong (hundreds of millions of USD).
“Vietnam has been working hard to materialise international commitments to reducing natural calamities and adjusting climate change,” said the deputy PM.
The event, officially themed as the “Second national forum on natural calamities reduction and climate change adjustment”, was co-sponsored by the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR), UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID).
It targeted agencies at all levels to join hands in research and dialogue as well as to share information and human and financial resources in reducing natural disasters and the impacts of climate change.
The forum also launched a campaign to respond to UNISDR’s global programme, “Disaster Resilient Cities” and encourage several cities in Vietnam to join the programme.
Vietnam, situated in one of five areas most prone to storms in the Asia-Pacific, has suffered losses by natural disasters equal to 1.5 per cent of GDP during the past decade.
Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Cao Duc Phat said climate change has caused a greater number of natural calamities which have become increasingly complex and unpredictable.
MORE INFO>>>
Vietnam ranks climate change as high priority | Look At Vietnam - Vietnam news daily update: "

Heat and moisture from Himalayas could be a key cause of the South Asian monsoon

Harvard climate scientists suggest that the Tibetan Plateau -- thought to be the primary source of heat that drives the South Asian monsoon -- may have far less of an effect than the Himalayas and other surrounding mountains. As the monsoon brings needed rainfall and water to billions of people each year, understanding its proper origin, especially in the context of global climate change, is crucial for the future sustainability of the region.

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See Also:

Earth & Climate

• Climate
• Environmental Issues
• Global Warming
• Weather
• Environmental Science
• Atmosphere

Reference

• Monsoon
• Himalayas
• Climate
• Atmospheric circulation

The researchers say the their findings, published in the January 14th issue of Nature, have broad implications for how the Asian climate may have responded to mountain uplift in the past, and for how it might respond to surface changes in the coming decades.

Often called the "roof of the world," the Tibetan Plateau is a vast area of 2.5 million square kilometers with an average elevation of more than 4,500 meters. Scientists have long theorized that the massive release of heat from the surface of the plateau -- with air being heated to higher temperatures over the plateau than air at the same height over lower-level surfaces nearby -- has been a major contributor to the strength of the monsoon.

"The South Asian monsoon supplies water to billions of people, many of whom live in developing nations and agricultural societies that are highly vulnerable to variations in this water supply," explains co-author Zhiming Kuang, Assistant Professor of Climate Science in Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) and Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences (EPS).

While the heating by the plateau does enhance rainfall along its southern edge, Kuang and his colleague William Boos, Daly Postdoctoral Fellow in EPS and an environmental fellow at the Harvard University Center for the Environment (HUCE), used an atmospheric circulation model to show that the large-scale South Asian summer monsoon circulation remains unaffected when the plateau is removed.

It turns out that the narrow geography of the Himalayas and other nearby mountain ranges can, in fact, produce an equally strong monsoon by insulating warm, moist air over continental India from the cold dry extratropics, the area between the subtropics and polar regions.

"Because heat from the plateau has been seen as the main contributor to the power of the monsoon, much attention has been given to changes in the plateau's albedo, or its reflectivity level of the sun's radiation," says Kuang.

For example, a decrease in snow cover over the Tibetan Plateau resulting from an increase in global temperatures can affect reflectivity, and hence, the level of heat. The revised theory, emphasizing the important role the mountains play in trapping warm and moist air, suggests that climate scientists should pay as much attention to changes over the Indian subcontinent due to, for example, land use.

How the region's natural environment is modified through activities such as building, mining, and agriculture, Zhang explains, can influence albedo and moisture, thus altering the temperature/humidity of the boundary layer air.

By considering the influence of both the plateau and the mountains on the strength of the monsoon, the Harvard researchers expect a clearer picture will emerge about the potential changes in the South Asian water supply in the coming decades.

"Ultimately, our revised view has implications for future projections of how the South Asian monsoon might be altered in a warmer world and can be used to infer aspects about the earth's climate history," says Boos.

Vietnam, US to cooperate in climate change

Vietnam and the US have announced that they are to establish a joint working group to study effects of climate change as part of a bilateral agreement on scientific and technological cooperation.
To this effect, an agreement was signed by Dr Tran Thuc, Director of the Vietnam Institute of Meteorology, Hydrology and Environment and Dr. Greg Smith, a scientist with the US Department of the Interior, in Hanoi on November 17.Speaking at the signing ceremony, Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Nguyen Cong Thanh said that the establishment of the Vietnam-US Working Group is an important event marking the start of the relationship between his ministry and the US Department of the Interior. “From this event, the two ministries will continue expanding their cooperation to other fields relating to the environment and natural resources,” he also said.The establishment of the working group will help to enhance the US ’ role in addressing world climate change issues, said Dr. Tran Thuc, who has been appointed as co-president of the working group. He added that this also lays a foundation for Vietnam to implement its national programme on climate change. A representative from Can Tho University told the event that the Delta Research and Global Observation Network (DRAGON) Centre will be formally inaugurated at the university on November 20. As an initiative undertaken by the US Department of the Interior, the centre will conduct research into climate change in the Mekong Delta, a densely populated, low-lying region with an extensive network of canals and rivers.
(Source: VNA)

Cambodia celebrates the World Tourism Day under the topic of 'Tourism responding to the challenge of Climate Change'

As a member of UNWTO, Cambodia celebrates the world tourism day every year so as to contribute the hot issue information and find out the key addresses in tourism sector.
Tourism responding to challenge of climate change is the hot topic of United Nation World Tourism Organization for world tourism day celebrating on 27 September 2008. This topic has trigged tourism and related field the discussion how tourism contributes to challenges of climate change which are the world hot issue. As one of the principle services exports in the world's

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poorest and emerging countries, tourism has the potential to act effectively on the common cause of climate change response, linking it closely with the fight against poverty. (www.tourismindochina.com/history-cambodia.htm)