ClimatePrep

by Jonathan Cook, WWF-US

Sarus cranes (© Nguyen Van Hung )

A densely populated country with a very long coastline, Vietnam appears frequently on lists of the countries that are expected to be most seriously affected by climate change. And the Mekong Delta will be one of the most impacted areas within Vietnam: a broad, flat plain that receives the sediment-laden waters of the Mekong River, the Delta is home to about 18 million people. While it can be difficult to predict how climate change will impact a region as complex as the Mekong Delta, it is expected that sea level rise, increased storm surge, and saltwater intrusion will significantly threaten biodiversity and human livelihoods across the so-called Rice Bowl of Vietnam.

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By Nikolai Sindorf, WWF-US

Ploughing rice fields near Bandung, Java, Indonesia © Rob Webster / WWF

In 1997 I went to the western part of Java in Indonesia to perform research on agricultural water management. Java is one of the most densely populated regions and high-yielding rice paddy lands in the world. The focus of my research was how rice farmers dealt technologically and organizationally with ongoing reforms in large, engineered irrigation systems. During this research I met a farmer who had meticulously typed out his traditional cropping calendar. This cropping calendar — a titimangsa — read like a beautiful poem, describing the smell of the dew, the color of the sunset, the touch of the soil, and the observation of insect life cycles.

Based on this titimangsa, the farmer made decisions about when to start land preparation, sowing, harvesting, and other parts of the agricultural cycle in order to support the traditional rate of two to three rice harvests per year. By the late 1990s, farmers had already observed how traditional agricultural decision making was changing to more centrally planned modern irrigation systems, but each village still maintained a traditional water diversion and distribution networks as well. For village farmers, the traditional system added real flexibility to their daily water management.

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By Nikolai Sindorf, WWF-US

My job is to help conservation scientists and economic development professionals get ready for the impacts of climate change related to water. And today, I want to write about how we imagine a climate change warning label: “Use before 2050.” Reading current discussions on climate change based on global climate models, or on specific climate scenarios, 2050 is when “it” is going to happen — whatever it is.

Mekong in October 2009, during the boat races in Vientiane ©WWF-US, Nikolai Sindorf

I have never fully understood snapshot approaches to climate change studies that compare the current situation to 2050s. They do not tell the complete story of how climate change will affect particular places. Like a bad movie review, they actually spoil the plot as they reveal the ending, distracting us from focusing on the story as a process of change over time. The important difference between now and 2050 is not only “a projected 20% decrease in annual rainfall” (you can find many similar quotes on the web); the real difference between now and 2050 is that, in 2050, ecosystems and human communities will already have experienced an extra 40 years of increased climate fluctuation and variability. And this increased variability will have a big impact on humans and other species that may actually be more important than just talking about a change in the annual average rainfall. The latter snapshot approach often oversimplifies the complexity of change, while it gives a false sense of our capacity to accurately anticipate and prepare for change.

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