China turns on new Mekong River dam, despite adverse impact on fishes and farming in S-E Asia

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Its dam-building has created tensions with South-east Asian countries.

The geography of the Lancang river, with a sparse population in the upper reaches, lends itself to the building of hydropower plants and reservoirs.

China – whose appetite for energy has grown much over the past decades – views the development of dams as crucial to its renewable energy goals, which include becoming carbon-neutral by 2060. The biodiversity-rich Mekong River is South-east Asia’s longest river. It runs from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in China through to Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Fishing in the Lower Mekong Basin in South-east Asia is said to support the livelihoods of some 60 million people.

As a dialogue partner of the MRC, China consistently provides year-round hydrological data, which helps to improve river-monitoring capabilities and forecasts for floods and droughts in the Mekong countries, it added. “Mekong communities who have seen their fisheries decline, riverbank gardens and agricultural lands eroded have not been compensated for their losses. There needs to be much greater attention to how changes in the river brought by hydropower dams are affecting local communities,” she said.

 

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