Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

CONCLUDING REPORTIN“Roadmap toward Effective flood Hazard Mapping inLao PDR”
By:

Mr. Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDRJICA TRAINING COURSE ON FLOOD HAZARD MAPPING
31/Nov-02/Dec/2005

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

Title:“Roadmap toward Effective flood Hazard Mapping in Lao PDR”
Content:
A. “The role of flood Hazard maps to mitigate
flood damages in Lao PDR”
A-1. the Flood status in Lao PDR
A-2. the outline of the present countermeasures
for mitigating flood damages in Lao PDR
A-3. the useful of Flood Hazard Map andthe reasons in Lao PDR

Page
02-04
02
0304

B. “The allocation of roles in making flood
Hazard maps in Lao PDR”
B-1. Organization should hold the main responsibility
for making a fundamental map such as an anticipated
Inundation area map and making disseminating
flood hazard maps?

05-07

C. “The “Action Plan” of making
flood hazard maps in my country”
08-10
C-1. Which area do you choose forthe target river basin area? Why?
C-2. What do you think is necessary to make flood hazard maps in thechosen area?
Do you have data, maps, or budgets necessary
for making flood hazard maps?
C-3. Propose your own “Action Plan” within the next five years,
C-4. what seems to be a problem inmaking flood hazard map in Lao PDR?
D. “The course suggestions and advice in term of more meaningful”

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICAA. “The role of flood Hazard maps to mitigate flood damages in Lao PDR”
A-1. The Flood status in Lao PDR,
Excessive flooding is a worldwide problem, which in many countries results in loss oflife and extensive damage to infrastructure and agricultural production. In addition,
Flooding of the Mekong River and its tributaries is a recurrent event and each year
causes damage, in varying degrees, to agricultural production, rural infrastructure andhuman settlements.
So far, the floods in the LMB recalled as being the most serious for the entire lower
basin are the ones from 1961, 66, 71, 78, 95 and 96. Since 1961. This paper is mainly
focused on how important flood management could be mitigating flood damages toinfrastructure and agriculture production in area along the Mekong Basin. This appears
particularly true for the Lao PDR, given its strong economic dependence on agriculture.
In a developing and landlocked country, its reliance on natural resources, particularlywater and related resources, is uncomfortably high. Given the topography of this country,
it is very much at risk.
This report also shows how flood can be took its toll one the country, there are a numberof people powerless, and often hungry for the sufficient food become inundated. Aflood statistic has been showed as in 1995 during the flooding periods, 102,912 hectaresof Vientiane plain was under a range of 0.5-0.8 meter of water in the period of 8 weeks.
Therefore, 153,398 people affected by flooding in the Vientiane Plain (out of a total
population of 653 013 persons), 26,603 households, or 427 villages.
The table shows damages from flooding in the Vientiane Plain, 1995.
Persons affected: 153 398. Households affected: 26 603 Villages affected: 427
Land use

DamagePercentage

Transplanted area

42,337 ha

41.14%

Stream, swamp, bamboo, grassland

10,140 ha

9.85%

Clear forest, hill and pasture area

31,354 ha

30.47%

Residential and other areas

19,081 ha

18.54%

Total flood area

102,912 ha100%

Rice crop
Total area

61,142 ha

Other crops
17,167 ha

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

Flood affected

34,471 ha

7,866 haDamaged30,962 ha

4,313 haObviously, agricultural and rural development is a high priority for the government ofthe Lao PDR, and it is the policy of the Lao Government as the Lao National Mekong
Agreement strives to uphold, in accordance with the Socio-economic Development Plan.
Furthermore, national interests must be balanced with more regional interests, or
specifically for the Lao National Mekong Committee (LNMC), with the Lower Mekong
countries namely: Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, by upholding the 1995 Agreementon the Cooperation for the Sustainable Development of the Mekong River Basin.
A-2. The present countermeasures for mitigating flood damages in Lao PDR
The solutions to overcome the effect of the floods can be found at different levels indifferent sectors, involves cooperation and coordination at international, national,
provincial and field levels and can be classified as follows:- Countermeasure for National levelAt national level a better understanding is required of the flood behavior and the various
options to manage and regulate more effectively excess waters. Such national flood
management plans and strategies will include:•••

an assessment and classification of areas effected by regular flooding;a monitoring system to assess on a continuous basis the areas each year effectedby floods; andan overall flood control management plan to manage recurrent and exceptional
floods and to have in place emergency measures to reduce and overcome thedamage of exceptional floods.

Table shows Flooding depths, duration and areas in 1995 and 1996

Duration
Province/Prefecture Depth (m)(weeks)Flooded(ha)survey)1995 1996 1995 1996 1995
Vientiane Province 0.5–8 0

1–601996

Area Flooded Area
(field (ha)(DOIdata)
1995

1996

14,005 Negligible 12,358 131

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-ADLao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

Vientiane
Prefecture

0.5–8 0

Bolikhamxay
Province

2–8

Khammouane
Province

1–8

024,800 Negligible 18,565 200

1–5 2–8

1–4

9,154

4,276

13,452 6,069

1–6

1–6 1–7

1–7

8,958

9,470

17,378 17,266

Savannakhet
Province

1–8

1–8 1–8

1–6

3,965

14,95011,411 7,684

Champassak
Province

1–5

1–4 1–3

1–6

11,211 19,336

12,970 16,647

72,093 48,032

86,137 47,997

TOTAL

There are variety actions from Lao Government in term of mitigating flood damages insome provinces, which have been inundated regularly from time to time as show below:- Flood Control proposed project in Bolikhamxay Province•••

flood protection dike and control gates on the Nam Xan River,flood protection dike and gates on the Mekong River, and,flood protection dike and control structure on the Nam Kadan river and theclosure (by flap gates) of selected culverts on Road 13 in the area.

-Vientiane Plain flood protection: urgent phase
The project, Vientiane Plain Flood Protection, Urgent Phase, was financed by a grantfrom the European Commission (EC) of the European Union. The project objective wasto implement urgently required flood protection works to reduce the risk of the MekongRiver flooding Vientiane and adjacent areas of the Vientiane Plain.
•Rehabilitation existing flood protection dikes and associated structures andconstructed new dikes••

a 420 m reach of river bank protection works located in front of the Hat Dokkeo
the intermediate Casier Sud section, 25.3 km long. This was an existing dike,which protects an important agricultural area, including a number of irrigationsystems, which is a major supplier of agricultural products to Vientiane. The dikeis also an important rural road and finishes at the LaoStar Earth Satellite Stationon the Thadeua Road; andDone by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)•PWRI, JICA

the downstream Thanaleng to Dong Phosey section, 8.2 km long, which
consisted of two entirely new reaches of dike located on either side of theThai-Lao Friendship Bridge over the Mekong River.

A-3. The useful of Flood Hazard Map and the reasons in Lao PDR
In term of flood hazard maps in Lao PDR is not well known for all government, private
sector and local community. However, the government of Lao PDR has realized theimportant and the usage of flood hazard Mapping. The government has set up theorganization as Flood management Unit, Irrigation Department, to work properly with
MRC and LNMC. that is our good starting point to achieve the benefit from flood hazard
mapping. Therefore there might be a number of positive outcomes from flood hazard
map in mitigation of losses of agriculture land and agriculture production as showed
bellows:
In term of resident action, resident, and villager participation and usage:•FHM Shows the historical flood maps from the past to the local residents
especially farmer. Therefore, farmer could prepare and protect their own
agriculture land, agriculture production by their own capability at the beginningstage. For example, local agriculture committee should have a responsibility tobuild a small irrigation system to release amount of water in case heavy rain
occur by encouraging local residents, villager to get involved with government
corporation and assistance;•FHM to identify flood level marks to the residents in the reason of preparing
themselves for the event. For instance, farmer or local residents should
experience a level of flooding and they should level up the agriculture production
storage house in the high elevation level in case of flooding. Therefore,agriculture production would be protected from flooding.

•FHM to be guideline for flood fighting by local community itself for instance, abuild small dike by the local community, build up sand bag wall to protectflooding (emergency countermeasure).

In term of provincial and central government action, usage:•To make the resident reaction as above mentioned, National government,Province government should contribute some kind of small equipment, material
to the local resident and local resident would work as labor based system, (insome cases local resident might get paid in the reasonable unit cost, which is thebest option for providing a better in come for the local resident and also for
mitigating the damages from flooding.

•Use the Map as a part feasibility study stage or evaluation stage for constructing
flood control system such Dams, Dike, Levee, water storage, Irrigation system,

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________5Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

etc; In addition, central government should focus on some provinces which havebeen flooded frequently and make a priority project of construction flood control
for the most urgent circumstance.

B. “The allocation of roles in making flood Hazard maps in Lao PDR”
B-1. Organization should hold the main responsibility for making a fundamental
map such as an anticipated Inundation area map and making disseminating flood
hazard maps
Government has set up the flood Management Organization as show as chart below:

Prime Minister’s OfficeCommunication Transport
Department of Roads

Post and Construction

Waterways

Division

Ministry ofCommunication
Transport Post andDepartment of Urban andHousing

Department of Transport

Department of irrigation
Ministry of Agriculture
and Forestry

Department of meteorology
and Hydrology

Vientiane

Urban

Development
Vientiane City
Communication
Transport

PostandSocial Welfare
Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
MinistryofDoR.
Labour andLao PDR,
MCTPC,________________________________________________________________________________________________________Social Welfare

Disaster Project6

Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

FIGURE 1
Data flows from Lao PDR line ministries to the MRC

This grouping represents the cross-sectional interests involved in Mekong development. It is,therefore, the role of the LNMC to act as the coordinating mechanism between the MRC,currently based in Bangkok, and the relevant line ministries of the Lao Government. In all ouractivities, national interests must be balanced with regional interests, which ultimately serve us
all. So, to take flooding as the case in point, Lao government policies will be fed into MRC
projects related to flood management, irrigation, hydrology, environment, monitoring, mappingand so on.
FIGURE 2Information flows from the MRC to the Lao PDR line ministries

With regard to flood issues in Laos, the main departments the LNMC coordinates with are:•the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology, Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry,
responsible for collecting data regarding tributaries of the Mekong in Laos;

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)•PWRI, JICA

the Inland Waterways Division, Department of Communication under the Ministry ofCommunications, Post, Transport and Construction, responsible for collecting data on
the mainstream; and•the Flood Management Unit of the Department of Irrigation, also within the Ministry ofAgriculture and Forestry, shares information with the LNMC.

FIGURE 3
Financial flows from the MRC to the Lao PDR line ministries

The main transfers that take place are:•data from line ministries (departments) to the MRC (Figure 1);•information from the MRC to departments in the line ministries;•funding and financial flows from the MRC to various flood-forecasting projects in Lao
PDR (such as flood protection dykes). The only exception would be if funding has beenarranged bilaterally between a department or ministry, and a donor.

E. “The “Action Plan” of making flood hazard maps in my country”

C-1. Which area do you choose for the target river basin area? Why?
Lao PDR constitutes a major part of the Lower Mekong Basin (LMB), which comprises as wellThailand, Viet Nam and Cambodia. The LMB has always been prone to yearly recurrent
flooding in the period from June to October. The flooding pattern is never sudden and mainly
characterized by slow but steady rising of the water level and inundation of the alluvial plains.
Therefore, this paper focused on all the agriculture, land use and infrastructure long Mekong
Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
8Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA

River and also nearby the sub river around country.

C-2. What do you think is necessary to make flood hazard maps in the chosenarea?
Government could use FHM as one component for making priority project of flood control
system that mean FHM could identify which area are the most urgent to make a improvement
and to construct flood control system namely Dyke, water gate control, Irrigation, etc, in thereason of mitigating damages, losses of land use, agriculture field and agriculture production.
Secondly, in term of resident action based on local committee and villager participation, local
resident and farmer would use FHM to analyze the flood level that would be occurred. Therefore,
local committee and residents need to work together for constructing flood protection using“Labour Based Method” which note that provincial government need to support them by basic
payment or material usage and local resident could work as man-hour and also in the case offlood fighting.

C-3. Propose your own “Action Plan” within the next five years,
Do you have data, maps, or budgets necessary for making flood hazard maps?
General:•Flood Management Unit, Department of Irrigation, Ministry of forestry andagriculture should have a project proposed as local community participation fordisaster management;•Participant required:
1. Two persons from central government especially from FMU, MFA.
2. 1 person from provincial level, relevant to flood management
3. 1 person from district level, relevant to flood management (focus on 1
serious district of flooding)
4. In chosen district, selecting 5 to 6 villages to participate the meeting.
5. Each village has to send 5 person or more in deferent criteria concerning
an gender, relevant work responsibility, head of village, and woman
union.

Action Plan:•Set up the project as local Community participation based disaster Management;•Sector focus: Flood Hazard preparedness and Mitigation;•Special focus: District and Community level;

Questionnaire: (local residents or villager participation)•

What are the damages and losses from flood disaster? (List them all)•What are the most urgent damage and loss? (Make a priority)

Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)

PWRI, JICA•

Try to ask them what they could act to help themselves fist?

•Name the proper solution based on their requirement•Write a project proposal such as small dike, Irrigation as local residents and villagerparticipation) and 80% finding a fund resource by government or international agency.

Objectives:•

Building government institutional capacity at provincial and district level;•

Develop and strengthening village level organization for risk management;•

Develop flood warning system;•

Building small Irrigation (using Labour based);•

Develop more various agriculture system better adapted to recurrent flood

Implement;
A. Define groups of community•

Training will be focused on government and village leaders and professionals•

Create a series of village communities
6. Village disaster Protection unit;
7. Farmer’s group;
8. Small irrigation and Dam management community;
9. Village health worker group;

B. Define problems and solution (individual participant)•Make a group discussion;•

Try to find problems by everyone participation (water level estimating and recording)•Participatory mapping (Maps are produced showing hazards of flooding area and safe area);•

Maps are displayed an the wall of the temple of villages and in the village head’s house inone;

Action•Introduce about flood early warning (announcement and massaging river flow measurementby trained village worker who report approaching flood hazards to media and throughdistrict;•

Local community work along with small Irrigation and dike management for building it or
repair it for handling flood;

C-4. What seems to be a problem in making flood hazard map in Lao PDR;FHM is quite difficult to make in the short period of time. Therefore, the proposed
project as local community participation for disaster management is an ideal plan for
mitigating flood disaster and also other disaster at the same time. However. There is
still variety of problem remaining the organization itself. Below are some of theproblems identified:
Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
10Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________Flood Hazard Mapping
Training Course (TBIC Center)•PWRI, JICA

As a project “Local Community participation for disaster management” needs tobe approved by the relevant Ministry. Therefore, the budget allowance available
for running the work.

•Need all participated person from vary type of all government level, local
resident, villager as mentioned above to be participate to full time for themeeting.

•Persons who are from central Government and provincial level needs to have
deeply understand about disaster management. Therefore, they could contributethe sufficient knowledge to the local resident and villager;•Those people above-mentioned have to prepare a schedule of working task for theresident and villager and also district level. (Need official information letter signby minister of relevant ministry)Done by Mr Anousone SISA-AD
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Lao PDR, MCTPC, DoR.
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