Speech by Mr Hermen Borst, Deputy Delta Commissioner of the - PDF document

Speech by Mr Hermen Borst, Deputy Delta Commissioner of the Netherlands, at the Mekong Delta Conference, 27 September 2017, Can Tho, Vietnam. Check against delivery. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, When Prime Minister Phuc visited the Netherlands earlier this year, I had the privilege to present some lessons learned from the Delta Programme of the Netherlands of relevance for the work on the Mekong Delta. I am grateful for your invitation and hope to add some of these to the discussions at this pivotal event today. I will explain in more detail, but in case you are in a hurry or want to twitter: here is the executive summary [slide 2] : 1. It helps to have clear strategic direction through a few structuring decisions 2. A dedicated governance structure enables cross-sectorial and interprovincial cooperation (and really, it is all about cooperation) 3. Shared responsibility for project development and shared financial responsibility for implementation should go hand-in-hand [slide 3] In the Netherlands we embarked 7 years ago on an ambitious and innovative way to address climate change adaptation. This is the Dutch Delta Programme. It is a programme with two goals: to keep the Netherlands safe from flooding and supplied with sufficient fresh water, now and in the future. It is necessary to deal with sea-level rise, increasing climate extremes, and increasing risk of flooding and drought. It breaks with common practice of responding to a disaster after it occurs, something that is financially much more preferable. To make it work, we developed a new decision-making process, and dedicated financing. 7 years after its start, I think we can rightfully claim that it is working. Its success is all about cooperation. [slide 4] The Mekong Delta is not the Netherlands. It has a different natural, ecological, cultural and political setting. But its challenges sound only too familiar. Sea-level rise, subsidence, too much water (floods, like in 2011) or too little water (drought, like in 2016) and salinization. There is year-to-year variation in the seriousness of these challenges, but there is a clear trend. 1

These problems are all increasing over time, both in probability and impact. On top of this, upstream developments increase the unpredictability of their impact. Some of these problems you can mitigate, to others you will have to adapt. [slide 5] The focus of this Mekong Delta Conference is on large-scale transformations that to prepare the Delta for the future. It follows on an increasingly intense and productive debate amongst national, provincial and international stakeholders regarding the optimal strategy to provide a sustainable future for its 17 million inhabitants. Business as usual will not provide the desired outcome of long-term sustainability and prosperity; transformations are necessary to adjust to changing circumstances and to prepare for extremes. A consensus is taking shape on an agro-business orientation for the delta. This sometimes requires embracing change rather than fighting it, for instance by making use of salinization in the coastal zone, or restoring water retention upstream, and that this requires cooperation between provinces and across ministerial mandates. So, what may be, from the point of view of our own Delta Programme, some essential aspects to consider against this background and exciting developments like the drafting of the regional masterplan. Preparing the delta for the extremes of climate change, or the threat of subsidence, requires adjustment of land-use, of agricultural production systems and its infrastructure. This cannot be achieved within the mandate of a single ministry. It is a cross-sectorial challenge requiring an integrated answer. It requires cooperation. And it starts with the following question: How do we evaluate the contribution of investments to the long-term goal of a sustainable and prosperous Mekong Delta? [slide 6] In the Netherlands we solved this by agreeing on three core values: solidarity, flexibility and sustainability. These core values proved to be very useful as a quick qualitative means of evaluation. Take for instance the core value of flexibility. If we have a choice between one solution that provides more flexibility for adjustment in the future than another, we will favour that option. The reason is that flexibility to adapt is essential in a changing world. And if one solution is more sustainable than another (in economic, social or ecological terms), we select that solution. These values can also be translated into guiding principles like “soft solutions where possible, hard measures where unavoidable” or “avoid lock-in situations and keep options open”, or “living 2

with water”, like in our Room for the River programme. This is a first step towards reaching consensus on what to do, and even more importantly, on what to avoid. Just like in Vietnam, the challenges to our water management are interconnected and as a result taking decisions is very complicated. Using our core values as a starting point we evaluated different strategies for different regions. We came to understand that we needed to take a few key decisions first, in order to be able to decide on what to do next. We prepared them through a step-by-step process with all stakeholders, to create understanding and support for them. [slide 7] These structuring decisions we called the Delta Decisions and they form the core of our programme. In our case these Delta Decisions are a mix of national guidelines and key regional transformations. Transformation not unlike what is needed in Vietnam and similarly requiring the restructuring of the infrastructure of large areas. In the Mekong Delta you also have conflicting strategies. Here too the formulation of structuring strategic decisions as part of your master planning process will provide direction for investment. For example: a decision to prefer adjustment to salinity intrusion in the coastal zone over the alternative of fighting it will help avoid implementation of conflicting projects. A second might be a decision to restore floodplains and improve water retention in the upstream provinces, and a third a decision to phase-out ground-water use in the coastal provinces. You could translate such specific strategic decisions into all regional and provincial masterplans and evaluate project proposals against their contribution to these strategic goals. Such an approach certainly worked for us in the Netherlands. Actually such decisions will greatly help the process of formulating large-scale transformative projects and should be anchored in law. But that is not enough. The scale of such projects, in terms of scope and impact, requires many stakeholders to be involved and to cooperate to prepare and implement them. And it requires budget. If you want to implement a long-term development strategy, you need dedicated financing. [slide 8] We took several steps to develop a strategy supported by all stakeholders. The first was to appoint, by law, a special functionary. This so- called delta commissioner is responsible for the progress and coherence of all the separate activities within the program. He maintains the strategic direction of the program and prepares a yearly proposal containing short-term and long- 3

term measures for political decision-making. The appointment of the delta commissioner proved to be very effective. The way the delta commissioner reports to parliament may not fit your political system. But the essential part is to have a special functionary or entity, with sufficient capacity, who can coordinate and combine all opinions and prepare a proposal for political leadership to enable efficient decision-making. After all, it is all about cross- sectorial and interprovincial cooperation. Without such an entity we would not have been able to reach consensus on what to do. [slide 9] We also divided our program into subprograms focussing on specific problems and regions. In these subprograms teams of experts from different stakeholders work together on solutions and develop local strategies. They report to a local steering committee. This is altogether not that different from your solution to divide the delta into different zones. It is an important way to structure the aforementioned cooperation. The delta commissioner eventually combines these regional solutions into one optimal strategy. [slide 10] Yet another important aspect was the arrangement, by law, of dedicated financing. 1 billion euro/year of additional funds are reserved to help finance the implementation of this optimal strategy. This has proved a very strong tool to keep implementation on track. After all, a long-term investment program requires a long-term investment fund. This central government financing is supplemented with contributions from regional authorities. A special agreement on water financing details national and regional contributions and roles. In this way our delta programme became a coherent set of measures, implemented over time, focussed on a commonly accepted goal and guided by a set of shared values and principles as the result of shared decision-making on the one hand and of shared financial responsibility for implementation on the other. [slide 11] To summarize: - We established by law a multi-stakeholder long-term program for water safety and water availability based on shared values and a shared long-term vision. - The appointment of a special functionary responsible for progress and coherence of the program proved very efficient to help cooperation. 4