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at the same time. Local communities,
NGOs, policy makers, scientists and
designers need to partner and work
together with businesses investors and
foreign agencies like the World Bank.
“Storytelling,” he says, “helps us to
picture things, to make complex things
understandable and to take a wide range of
factors into account. We need storytelling
and design to embrace complexity, while at
the same time making things tangible and
insightful for all.”Tell us about the five Vietnamese
families in the documentary? Why were
they chosen?
We have defined five characters: boat
people, businesswoman, a family with kids,
rice and shrimp farmers. It’s a cross section
of the Mekong Delta: locations (from the
upper delta to the coast), gender, young
and old people, and people with different
socioeconomic backgrounds.
They all experience water and climate
challenges in different ways because of
their different backgrounds. How do
they cope with floods, salinization, land
subsidence and what are their adaptation
strategies?are less sediments then in the future the
delta will sink, rice fields will become less
fertile, and fishermen from the Mekong
Delta will catch less fish. Both rice and
fish are very important for food security
in Vietnam.
Land subsidence due to less sediments
and ground water extraction (impacts by
urbanization) is a big issue in the Mekong
Delta. Land subsidence is around 20-
40mm per year, which is much more than
5 mm/year sea level rise.
The Mekong Delta will also be affected
by much more heavy rainfall. Rising
temperatures and floods will lead to an
increase in diseases both from mosquitoes
and other water-borne illnesses.
When the Mekong River Delta
experiences longer and dryer summers
because of climate change, how will that
affect the rest of the world?
Vietnam needs an approach in which
water safety and food security are
protected. The Mekong Delta has an
important role to play here because its
20 million citizens produce rice and fish
for nearly 200 million people. The better
the water management is regulated, the
more mouths can be fed in Vietnam,
Southeast Asia and even the world.
For those who rely on the Mekong Delta
for their livelihood, what can they do to
shift their reliance away from it? What
alternative options do they have besides
migrating to big cities for work?
If they live near the coast, they could,
for example, change from being a rice
farmer to a sustainable shrimp farmer
as a response to salinization. In the
upper region, the government could
propose breaching high dykes. These
dykes enable farmers to arrange three
rice crops instead of two. However, this
third rice harvest is bringing down prices
and thus farmers are not earning more
money. The other downside is that these
high dykes are blocking the deposition of
sediments which will lead to less fertile
fields. These high dykes are also causing
floods and erosion elsewhere.
How did Henk Ovink, the Dutch Envoy
for International Water Affairs, become
involved? What role does he play in
the documentary? What solutions can
he give to fight climate change in The
Delta?
Henk Ovink went to the Mekong
Delta last year and was impressed by
the resilience of the people and how
they cope with these challenges. He
is endorsing our Me and Mekong web
documentary project.
We did an interview with him for
Nextblue (next.blue/en/2018/06/20/
interview-henk-ovink-about-water-
opportunities-in-asia/). He is promoting
a process where coalitions are built out of
the local communities, coalitions where
local talent is matched with the talent
of the world. The key is to come up with
inclusive, comprehensive urban water
solutions, while strengthening governance
You wrote a book called Living with the
Mekong, what will the web documentary
cover that the book didn’t?
The most important difference is the
interaction with the people. We want
to make a web documentary in a way
that you feel that you are there, on the
ground, in the mud fields listening to
and learning from the local people.
The unique character of Me and
Mekong includes stories from both
professionals and home videos made
by the locals because they know their
environment best. We share the stories
of local citizens told through their
phones.What happens after the documentary is
produced?
The Me and Mekong web documentary
project is supported by the Netherlands
Embassy in Vietnam, Wageningen
University and other sponsors from the
Netherlands, such as HaskoningDHV.
Our goal is to exchange local
knowledge from locals about water and
climate and food with professionals
through stories.
The web documentary will
be launched at the Amsterdam
International Water Week
AIWW in November 2019 (www.
internationalwaterweek.com). It’s an
excellent programming for a broad
audience, for professionals and people
interested in the environmental and
social consequences of climate change
and everyone who has the ambition
to change the world. We are thinking
about screening events in Vietnam
and other countries. We think this Me
and Mekong film project is just the
beginning of a series on the challenges
to the river deltas worldwide.
We will train local youths in the
Mekong Delta on how to make videos
about water, climate and environmental
issues. This workshop will be held in
An Giang Province from August 1-4.
Their videos will be part of our final web
documentary. For more info, visit next.blue/en/Henk Ovink