Think carefully and look around when managing water

     The Central Administration Court has come to a verdict for the government to withdraw its plan for water management. It has ordered that the government comply with the Constitution, and arrange public hearings to listen to stakeholders and others prior to policy implementation in which contractors are employed to design each module and plan. The issue of water management has therefore become a project of interest, valued at more than 300 billion baht. Another issue of public interest, is that the bidder company, K-Water is classified insolvent, creating a corruption risk in projects, etc. These are important issues that need to be closely monitored, though they are just minor details concerning project implementation. The more important issue is whether the project will be able to achieve its objectives or not, and if the project will provide a complete water management system or not.  

     In my view, the answer to these questions is ?no.?I have at least three reasons to support my view.

     The budget for investment in flood management is about 2.2 hundred billion Baht, or 70 percent of the total project value; the emphasis is temporary reservoirs, or flood-ways, flood barriers, the improvement of water routes. Even though these projects are urgent, just in terms of flood management to rebuild confidence, these projects do not cover every dimension of water management. In fact, water management includes the management of much more than just floods. Problems related to water include the problems of flood, drought and waste water. However, these projects have not been integrated in order to solve water problems in different dimensions. For example, instead of releasing excess water out to sea, the government should give priority to a catchment building or to the diversion of excess water to areas where there is water scarcity.

     Furthermore, by emphasizing the construction of small reservoirs, investment  becomes relatively high. For example, Module A1 will see the construction of many small reservoirs, giving a total capacity of 1.3 billion cubic metres, at the cost of 50 billion Baht. But consider the  Kaeng Sua Ten Dam Project, a dam of similar capacity, which has a spent budget of only 13 billion Baht.

     In fact, flood management can be divided into three stages, being those before, during, and after a flood. This project, however, emphasizes issues prior to flooding, for example, providing several protection systems. But there is no management system in place for conditions arising in time of flood, for example in case of evacuation, the transportion of supplies, adequate living quarters, information provided to the public, volunteer mobilization, etc, and there are no systems in place for the rehabilitation of the injured and compensation of the damaged.

     Flood prevention cannot be completely prevented because this project emphasizes only the prevention of surface water, but the risks of rain and seawater are ignored. Accessories also carry a variety of problems, from the super computers in the Meteorology Department that cannot be used, as they are out of date, having no spare parts to make repairs with. Thus, predictions are caused to be inaccurate and  forecasts cannot be made a long time in advance. Forecasts cannot be made at sub-district level, or in the case of sea water driven storm surge, there is no serious study.

     The project focuses on a physical investment or on an investment in hardware, but the government does not emphasize investment in software and peopleware.

The development of management system Software is still not clear. The inefficiency of  government management has been the major problem in coping with floods in the past. There have been several problems to the government's flood management, including a lack of coordination between government agencies, delivering wrong signals to the people, a lack of early warning systems, and giving  delayed and inadequate assistance.

     Peopleware promotes personnel development and creates knowledge for Thai society, related to water management.  Most Thai people do not know what this three hundred billion Baht investment project is derived from. There have been no public hearings and no study on the impact of this project. The floods of 2011 informed that Thailand has very few experts in this field.

     I agree that people should participate in the planning of water management, because all people are affected by it, more or less. It should not only be promoted as a water management solution to an immediate problem, but should focus on solving  problems in the long run. If Thailand can solve problems of flood, drought, and wastewater, it will be one of Thailand?s levers to develop the country.

ศ.ดร. เกรียงศักดิ์ เจริญวงศ์ศักดิ์
นักวิชาการอาวุโส ศูนย์ศึกษาธุรกิจและรัฐบาล มหาวิทยาลัยฮาร์วาร์ด
kriengsak@kriengsak.com, http://www.kriengsak.com