Improving Flood and Drought Management in Agricultural River Basins: An Application to the Mun River Basin in Thailand

Agriculture productivity is regularly affected by floods and droughts, and the severity is likely to increase in the future. Even if significant efforts are spent on water development projects, ineffective project planning often means that they continue to occur or are only partly mitigated, for exa...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Water policy 2021-10, Vol.23 (5), p.1153-1169
Main Authors: Prabnakorn, Saowanit, Ruangpan, Laddaporn, Tangdamrongsub, Natthachet, Suryadi, F.X., Fraiture, Charlotte de
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agricultural management
Agricultural production
Agriculture
Coping
Crops
Cultivation
Development programs
Development projects
Drought
farm pond
Farm ponds
Farms
Fish ponds
Flood management
Floods
Floodwater
Grain cultivation
Harvesting
Impact analysis
Meteorology And Climatology
Natural disasters
Oxbow lakes
Productivity
Project planning
Rain
Rice
River basins
Rivers
Small farms
Storage
Storage capacity
Storage conditions
Water
water demand
water management
Water resources development
water supply
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Summary:Agriculture productivity is regularly affected by floods and droughts, and the severity is likely to increase in the future. Even if significant efforts are spent on water development projects, ineffective project planning often means that they continue to occur or are only partly mitigated, for example, in the Mun River Basin, Thailand, where 1000s of water projects have been implemented. Despite this, the basin regularly experiences floods and droughts. In this study, an analysis of the adverse impacts of basin-scale floods and droughts on rice cultivation in the Mun River Basin is conducted, and an estimation of the coping capacity of existing measures. The results demonstrate that while the total storage capacity of in-situ and ongoing projects would be sufficient to tackle both hazards, it can only be achieved if the projects are effectively utilised. Based on this, proposed solutions for the region include small farm ponds, a subsurface floodwater harvesting system, and oxbow lake reconnections. The suggested measures are practicable, economical, environmentally low-impact, and their implementation (if executed with appropriate care) would reduce flood and drought problems in the basin. Notably, the measures and calculation methods proposed for this basin can also be applied to other crops and regions.
ISSN:1366-7017
1996-9759
DOI:10.2166/wp.2021.011