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flood). Using an alternative strategy, some farmers
in the study carried out by START, have adapted to
floods by accepting them as part of the ecosystem,
adjusting their crop calendar, getting benefits from
nutrients being deposited to enhance soil fertility
and pollutants being washed from their farmland.
In addition, use of alternate crops and seed varieties
are also common adaptation measures of the farmer
in the Mekong River delta in Viet Nam (Snidvongs,
2006).
Some farmers are changing the variety of rice grown,
both seasonally as a response to climate forecasts and
semi-permanently, even though they are commercial
farmers and grow rice to match market demand.
The national government supports research and
development of seed varieties and provides financial
support for investment in farm sector infrastructure,
but other measures by the national government
reported by farmers are limited. In the Mekong River
delta, farmers have some financial resources and
benefits from a longer rainy season. The availability
of short-cycle rice varieties that are suitable for
growing on their farms and are accepted by the
market also gives them greater flexibility to vary
their rice cultivar and crop calendar, if the season
is expected to be unusually short or dry. Choices
of farmers are alternative cultivation practices to
reduce the risk of damage or loss to the rice crop
and investments to improve the productivity and
resilience of their farms (Snidvongs, 2006).
Action Plan Framework for Adaptation to Climate
Change in the Agriculture and Rural Development
Sector
The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
(MARD) has developed an Action Plan Framework
for Adaptation to Climate Change in the Agriculture
and Rural Development Sector, period 2008-2020.
Its general objective is to enhance the capacity of
the Government about adaptation and mitigation
to minimize the adverse impacts of climate change,
focusing on security of city’s residents (especially at
the Cuu Long river deltas and the central mountainous
areas), food security, and the maintenance of
infrastructure for disaster prevention. It also shows
clear efforts to link the disaster management
activities, which were mainly under the mandate of
MARD, with climate change adaptation activities.
It also describes seven specific objectives, which
can be summarized to create policies to integrate
climate change into development plans, define
responsibilities, develop an Action Plan that support
policies and human resources for implementing
policies, strengthen research, impact projections
and international cooperation (to get technical and
financial assistance), and to enhance awareness.
The Action Plan does not identify specific
adaptation measures but contains main tasks to
allow development of such measures as part of its
implementation. The main tasks of the action plan
are defined according to specific objectives, which
are further broken down in detailed activities,
role of implementing agencies, outputs and the
implementing duration. The main tasks are to
disseminate knowledge and experiences to achieve
awareness of climate change impacts and greater
knowledge of adaptation among government
officials, staff and communities; develop human
resources and studies to provide adaptation
solutions, to include climate change issues in
sectoral developing programs through policy
systems; encourage international cooperation to
seek funding, promoting relationships, mobilizing
and using aid, etc.; and finally prioritizing activities
for implementing adaptation and mitigation policies.
Gaps Identified in Programs and
Studies
In order to improve the research capacities, a
network focusing on agricultural issues is needed
in the Southeast Asia Region. Also, more local
research capacity needs are to be developed, forums
to exchange research results and to develop further
joint activities that may lead to further policy
implementation (Snidvongs, 2006).
Also improved tools and data are important for
future study in climate change. Among various
tools and data needed are high resolution climate
scenarios, local ability to run climate model at high
resolution, with ability to fine tune the simulation
to match specific requirement of impact analysis in
each area of study.
It is considered important to improve knowledge
transfer and capacity building; transfer in form
of training to local researcher at least in the initial
stage. The study on climate change and its impact
as well as vulnerability and adaptation need to be
conducted on many other systems and sectors in
many other aspects to produce information that can
support policy making. In order to do this, institution
capacity as well as researchers still needs to be
further developed and expanded.
Finally, and referring to the scale, there are big
differences between objectives and limiting factors,
and the prevalence and effectiveness of different
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