30 July - 5 August 2012 - orsam

ASEAN Nations Discuss Strategic Water Management Plan
Vietnam, QUANG NINH — Representatives of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN), met last week in Vietnam‘s Quang Ninh province to evaluate and discuss cooperative
water resources management initiatives, including the ASEAN Strategic Plan of Action on Water
Resources Management.
The meeting of the 12th for the ASEAN Working Group on Water Resources Management on July
25-27 focused on aspects of the strategic plan that involve water data management, risks and impacts
associated with changing climate, river classification systems, and activities that increase awareness
of water issues and knowledge of and participation in water management.
Member states also discussed regional water events like Singapore International Water Week, the
Clean Environment Summit Singapore 2012 and the Second-Asia Pacific Water Summit.
The ASEAN Strategic Plan of Action on Water Resources Management was passed in 2005 to handle
issues regarding supply and demand of freshwater, freshwater quality, sanitation access, extreme
weather events and improving governance and capacity building.
The meeting was co-chaired by ASEAN Chairman for Water Resources Management Chua Soon
Guan and Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Bui Cach
Tuyen.
Both the United States and China are dialogue partners to ASEAN, whose members include
Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Burma, the Philippines, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and
Vietnam.
Earlier this month, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, addressing an ASEAN ministerial
conference in Cambodia, described six pillars of American policy in the region: cooperation,
economic integration and trade, engagement in the Lower Mekong region, transnational threats,
democratic development, and war legacies.
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