The Netherlands is helping Thailand with a plan against flooding
The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, in collaboration with the Dutch embassy, is working on a flood control plan Thailand to counteract. This flood prevention plan should provide a long-term solution to the rising sea levels that threaten Bangkok and the coastal provinces every year.
The Netherlands has been asked by the Thai government to help with a solution to the problems of water management. Thailand sees the Netherlands as the world's leading expert in the field of dams, dykes and measures against flooding. A team of Dutch technicians and Thai officials will conduct joint research this week in the provinces along the coast of the Gulf of Thailand.
A seminar on flood prevention was held yesterday. Dutch civil servants and experts from various disciplines have explained which methods could be used. Thailand's Science Minister Virachai Virameteekul said that both short-term and long-term solutions need to be worked on. He did not give details about the timeframe in which the plans should be implemented.
The Dutch government has pledged several million euros in budget. This can be used to fund research and to start mapping out all legal aspects, said the Dutch ambassador to Thailand, Tjaco van den Hout.
The Netherlands started developing flood plans decades ago. The technology that the Netherlands uses for this is regarded as the best and most advanced in the world. More than half of the Netherlands is protected by dikes and flood defences. More than 4 percent of the 7 million Dutch people live in this area, which is 60-16,6 meters below sea level, the ambassador said.
Flood Management Expert, Anon Sanitwong of Ayutthaya, said Bangkok, Chon Buri, Samut Songkhram, Samut Sakhon and Chachoengsao are the areas most at risk.
“Flood management is now mainly organized at a local level per province and lacks an integrated approach. This could be driven and further developed based on Dutch knowledge and technology,” he added.
Source: The Nation (courtesy of Paul)
Nice job for BosKalis, and I just happen to work for it.
I am also curious who will be awarded the job in Pattaya, spraying up the beaches.
The Fairway is already there 🙂
Is just a bit broken as far as I know, or they must have refurbished it again.
Henk, a nice idea, but before Boskalis or someone else gets involved, a lot, a lot of water will flow to the sea.
What is stated in the message is that money will be made available “to finance an investigation and to map legal aspects”.
This means that an engineering firm such as Grontmij or DHV first receives a nice assignment that can take several years to complete. Then a follow-up study will probably be released, another nice assignment. Only then will you get close to the point where yes or no is said and Boskalis, for example, could get to work.
or that those piles of produced reports disappear into a desk drawer until further notice.
The same thing happens with development aid. Young boys/women are sent to a developing country to investigate “the feasibility of a project” -feasibility study-, for example building a pumping station, a school, clearing forest land to agricultural land, developing new products, etc. a lot of these kinds of small projects are put forward and if there is no project in a certain country, the development worker will come up with a few, so that he will be able to work in that country again for a long time.
However, the vast majority of those projects are “not feasible” and the report disappears forever in the filing cabinet. I had some dealings with it in the eighties and some project descriptions a small child could tell you that that project would never get done. But yes, the development employee makes a thick report with all kinds of drawings, graphs, etc. and has thus covered his salary and expense report for a few months to a year. Pure waste of tax money!
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Can you tell us something about it being “not feasible”. Not prophetic, but it's too bad now. I live on a high mountain, so they get some land from here. It is good for employment and means of transport. But perhaps this is a bit too simplistic. I'm interested though.
Are they taking some soil here, off the mountain?
No, that's not how it works, the soil is reclaimed from the sea and reclaimed somewhere for land reclamation, a costly job.
Delivering with trucks is not feasible.
My last land reclamation job was to reclaim 3000000 m3 of soil in Genoa "Italy" to make a container port,
Soil was removed with a hopper dredger in the already existing harbours, so it then doubles, more water depth so ships can be received with a greater draft, and land reclamation a little further.
This procedure also applies to the beaches of Pattaya, a hopper sucks in sand and blows it out again on the beach, after which it is leveled out by bulldozers.
That is then a win-win situation. And the beaches of Pataya are nice for the tourists. I understand that the problem arises from the abundant rain, which mainly comes from the east to the west. The rivers swell and overflow their banks. Comparable to the Meuse. Elevation by means of dikes along the rivers seems to me more desirable than land reclamation near the sea. It is already starting in the north. The heavy monsoon rains are already almost flooding the Ping River near Chiangmai. If all that water disappears over the Khorat plateau to the south and plus the rain that has fallen there, it is understandable that the water will look for another way out. I think the runoff of the water into the Gulf of Thailand is what needs to be stimulated. And given global warming, the melting ice cap, there will be little suction from that side. Rather resistance.
Aren't they a little late on that? Think so. If they don't start now, Bangkok will be uninhabitable within five years. Doing a few more years of study is certainly to be rejected, but who knows, money money and more money.
In itself, the initiative to share our knowledge of water management with other countries is very good. But is the Netherlands able to make 'several millions' available in these times to a country such as Thailand that can support itself financially? Aren't there poor countries such as Bangladesh that need our expert help more?
Let's be. Thailand is not a developing country, although some aid organizations would have us believe it. The distribution of wealth is a point of discussion.
As long as this country can still purchase fighter jets in Sweden, neighboring Cambodia makes a military response, throws recognized refugees across the border against all international standards and principles (or takes them to sea in boats), lets 16-year-old girls drive a car and then find out the cause of the problem. to look for the drama elsewhere (could it have been the road signs?).
No, let's start financing water management in countries where the need is greater.
The “good” part of this plan is that the money will be made available, but will largely remain in the Netherlands. After all, a Dutch engineering firm (or a European registration option must be created) is given the assignment to carry out the study.
As a condition for such a study, the Netherlands should receive a commitment from Thailand that if the plan is good, something will actually happen and that money will be made available for this from Thailand.
Incidentally, this is not the first time that research has been carried out in Thailand into water management, there must already be whole zippers of filing cabinets full of reports from the past. So a new study can start by studying what has already been studied, what the results were and what happened to it.
At the moment, a Master Plan from 1996 (?) is still in effect, which must be completed in 2018.
Well, I'm very skeptical about this kind of help. I myself have had to deal with project funding due to my work. Making reliable agreements with governments is difficult in certain continents. In 2008, the Netherlands promised financial support to Laos to build a bridge. Subsequently, a tender was issued and Chinese tenderers won the contract and European tenderers were left behind. The question then arises whether the bridge was built with the materials as agreed or with cheaper and inferior materials? In Vientiane in September, I spoke to a government official who drove off in a Lamborghini Gallardo after the conversation.
We just have to sell our expertise through invoicing. We have paid tuition fees and conducted research. Thailand is really capable of financing water management projects itself. And the planes that make rain through chemical products may have to fly a little less…………………………..?
Skeptical? Well, I am too, you can conclude that from my two reactions!
The Twitter message from the NWP (Netherlands Water Partnership) is a good addition
to the earlier story from The Nation. Read:
http://www.nwp.nl/nieuws/index.php?we_objectID=11898
So there has been a mission from the Netherlands and now let's see what happens. There will be a follow-up seminar on March 10, which I am very much looking forward to. I'm going to try to get a report on that seminar and then come back to it.
In the Bangkok Post there has already been an amount that is withdrawn from Thailand to prevent another flood. (A LOT) The problem is of course that a third of this amount goes into the pocket of the signature setters. This already starts with all actions starting before work. So also with our pre-studies