CONCLUSION OF THE 2002 TASAEOVERVIEW
The 2002 Tsukuba Asian Seminar on Agricultural Education (TASAE) was held on
6-12 November 2002 and had participants, country representatives, each of whom delivered
their respective country reports. The representatives were Dr. Xinxiao Yu (China), Dr.
Hidayat Pawitan (Indonesia), Dr. Soon Hyuk Lee (Korea), Dr. Noel Trustrum (New Zealand),Dr. Danielito T. Franco (Philippines), Dr. Roy C. Sidle (Singapore), Dr. Veerasak Udomchoke(Thailand) and Dr. Hideji Maita (Japan). The theme of the Seminar was “Present situation on
the water resources and water related disasters, and the role of agro-environmental education”.
PRESENT SITUATION
Present situation on the water resources and water related disasters, and the role ofagro-environmental education in participating countries can be summarized as follows:
China
The general situation of Chinese water resource and water related disasters wereintroduced in the paper. China will have a severe water resource situation until 2050; only
2.7x1012 m3 water is available now every year with increasing serious water pollution. Ecoenvironment is in deterioration under a great water deficit. Flood, drought, soil erosion andwater pollution are dominant water related disasters in China; they have affected our
productivity, daily life and the whole eco-environment.
Current situation of agro-environmental education is closely followed. China has 44
middle and high agricultural and forestry schools, with 15 corresponding disciplines. Highagro-environmental education mainly exists in soil and water conservation and combating
desertification, agricultural resources and environment and horticulture in 53 schools. By 50
years of development, Chinese forestry environmental education accompanied with resourceand environment related discipline has formed an omni bearing cultivation system, which
benefits Chinese people to manage water resources rationally and improve their ability tocombat disasters greatly.

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The 2002 flood events in Indonesia occurred all over the country taking death tolls of
155 deaths, 13 missing and some 383,900 people evacuated of their homes as floods damaged
more than 3,100 houses and inundated another 94,600 houses. The estimated economic lossesof this recent Jakarta flood alone were 5-6.7 trillion Rp (more than half a billion USD),
accounting direct material damages and indirect losses as impacts of the flood. These
disasters had awakened awareness of the decision makers and legislators in Indonesia of theimportance of water resources and water related disasters to the national economy that opened
new challenges to natural scientists, especially meteorologists, hydrologists and climatologists,
to contribute professionally to the community. Population pressure with intensive agriculture
and recent rapid physical development implied extensive land use changes and increased water
demand that generated degraded lands and soil erosion, and to cause long-term changes inregional hydrologic regimes in Indonesia. The impacts of floods and droughts are
significant; causing crop failures and severe droughts that is associated to El Nino phenomena
also induced forest fires and transboundary haze problems that can disrupt air transport. The
importance of agro-environmental education is recognized and fulfilled mostly by State
Universities with faculties in agro-complex subjects, however in present situation in practice,there is a lack of necessary hydro-climate information from actual observations.
Korea
Korea has a mean annual precipitation of 1,283 mm. that is 30% higher than that of
the world’s average, 973 mm. However the annual average precipitation per capita is 2,705
m3, which is mere 10% of the world’s average of 26,800 m3. Due to the topography andclimate conditions, Korea’s river flow considerably varies throughout the year, which
repeatedly causes serious natural disasters such as flood damage, drought, loss of lives andproperty.
Korea should fully prepare to secure water resources and overcome droughts. For
this end, drought measures including construction of small and medium multi-purpose dams
and small water exclusive dams and expanded development of multi-regional water system in
addition to the development of ground water, ground water dam and combined management ofdams within river systems and operation of water resources information system should beestablished and pursued.
In addition to aforementioned measures, policy and regulations for water saving
should be established and various water related information should be easily available in realtime through the development of an integrated water resources management system.

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New Zealand
On a world scale New Zealand has abundant fresh water, but the degree of spatial andtemporal variability of rainfall results in severe climatic and hydrological extremes that cause
floods and droughts and erosion and sediment disasters. Although water resources (and related
water disasters) are fundamental to New Zealand’s social and economic well-being, questions
can be raised with regard to their sustainability given the potential for depletion over the
longer term. Furthermore, the degree to which formal education focuses on these issues isminimal with few tertiary students studying environmental processes and their impacts.
Although general public awareness is fickle and only becomes heightened following extreme
storms and droughts, management of water resources and their impacts is embodied inresource management law and is implemented by national and regional organizations withincreasing levels of community participation.
Attention is moving towards a more integrated understanding of catchments
dynamics and their behavior through time. New research prorgammes integrate land and water
environments to assess land- use effects on sediment and carbon fluxes from river basins tooceans, and the potential role they play in addressing global greenhouse gas and climatechange issues.
Philippines
Among the various countries of Southeast Asia, the Philippines is the mostgeographically disadvantaged, climate-wise, being located at the natural trajectory of tropicalstorms born in the Western Pacific and the South China Sea. Twenty (20) of such storms on
the average, affect the Philippines each year. Some in interaction with the monsoons and theintertropical convergence zone, cause extensive damage to agriculture, fisheries and public
infrastructure due to floods, stormy winds and landslides.
The country is periodically affected by intense ENSO phenomena every 4 to 5 years,
the main consequence of which are prolonged droughts that reduce or destroy crops andfisheries.
These recurring disasters are among the major reasons why Philippine economic
growth has lagged behind its ASEAN and Asian neighbors. Money, which could have been
invested for long-term development, has to be spent for reconstruction and disaster alleviation.
Crop and fishery production failures due to floods and droughts force importation using
valuable foreign exchange. This scenario has repeatedly occurred over the last 50 years.
The natural factors causing floods and droughts interact with population driven landuse change as forest to agricultural conversions, agriculture to housing or industrial use

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conversions resulting to high soil erosion losses, which in turn reduce land productivity.
Finally there are inadequate facilities and low public investments for baselinehydrometeorologic data generation. There is likewise a lack of political resolve to implement
national policy for effective land and water resources conservation and utilization.
Singapore
Much of the potable water in the Southeast Asian region comes from headwaters
emanating from forests and agricultural lands. However, many of these forests have, in recent
years, been subjected to so many land conversions, from forests to agricultural lands, forest to
oil palm plantations and other industrial land uses. Thus, all these changes in land coversignificantly affected the quality, quantity and timing of water. It is during these past
decades when countless water related disasters have been recorded, disasters which have hadgreat impact on the environment such as severe flooding, landslides, debris flows and severe
soil erosion, plus the widespread sedimentation which all posed threat and hazards to humans,
infrastructures and property. The severity of natural hazards can increase depending on theenvironmental activities. And for this matter the Southeast Asian countries, compared toother parts of the world, faces a greater risk due to the fact that many of these countries aretrying to cope up with the economic losses. This results to increasing the demands for land
uses, which unfortunately only causes environmental stresses. The media keeps on blamingthat the cause of these environmental disasters, particularly water-related disasters, isdeforestation which is undoubtedly one factor but, it must still be viewed in a much wider
scope. The land use changes are driven by so many factors, such as urbanization,industrialization, and enormous demand for timber by a growing population. These changes
in land cover all affect the hydrologic processes. While much of the water related disasters in
the Southeast Asian region are a combination of so many interactions of environmental andanthropogenic activities, there remain, the need to really understand the dynamics of the water
resources and the urgency to consider the sustainability of the water resource. Government
policies must address both the economic needs of the people but must also consider thesustainable use of the resources.
Thailand
There are 25 major watersheds in Thailand that drain 209,251.28 MCM. of annual
run-off by 1,421.27 mm. mean annual rainfall. The southern watersheds show the highest
mean annual specific yield as 28.52 liter/sec/km2 due to the higher rainfall amount. The
ground water recharge of overall area is 38,000 MCM, which are about 17% of the annual runoff and about 0.48% of the mean annual rainfall amount. The spatial and time distribution of4

climate resources were analyzed and mapped. Four major climatic regions were classified forthe rainfall amount, evaporation, annual mean temperature and topography. They were theEquatorial Climate, the Tropical Monsoon Climate with long rainy season, and the Tropical
Monsoon Climate with long dry season. The frequency and duration analysis of theinfluential factors on the climate in all seasons were carried out. Five seasons distinguished as
the Northeast Monsoon Season (NM) during January, February, November and December;
Summer Intermonsoonal Season (SIM) during March and April. Onset Southwest Monsoon
Season (OSM) during May and June, Southwest Monsoon Season (SW) during July, Augustand September; and Winter Intermonsoonal Season (WIM) during October. The climatic
regions and climatic seasons intently related with the climatic influences that comprise 9
components. The hydrometeorological disaster in Thailand comprises flooding, windstorm anddrought. Tropical storms accompanied by the Active Southwest Monsoon and the Active
Intertropical Convergence Zone. They play the major role on windstorm and flooding
disaster. The long-term stationary situation of Tropical Convergence Zone over Southern
China and Northern Thailand cause severe drought in the wet period of Central and Southern
Thailand as well as very wet condition in North and Northeast. Whenever the Active
Intertropical Convergence Zone moves down to Central and the Southern Thailand, heavy
rains will occur and flooding and landslides will follow. Drought in the dry period always
depends on the effect of El Nino and Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The very strong activity of
ENSO will cause the severe drought for a long dry period.
The role of governmental strategy on the agro-environmental education is concluded
into two main ideas. The people’s participation activity, which is the new hope that would
lead to natural conservation and watershed development using at most care for the benefits of
the next generation. The curriculum for the environmental and land care basement activities
is the earth science studies of the primary level (1-6) and the secondary level (6-12) for theunderstanding on the relationship and the interaction of geological resources, water resources
and atmospheric resources. As one of the strategies, the new generation will join hands to
put into practice the concept of people’s participation in taking care of their own land, forest,
watershed and atmosphere for better life and less natural disaster in the future.
Japan
Recent water demands in Japan have remained stable, or at least have not increased
since the 1990’s. At the same time, public awareness of the environment has forced water
managers and planners to rethink traditional approaches to water management in favor of newones that are necessary to respond to concerns about a return to a more natural hydrologic
regime to restore ecological and geomorphic functions to rivers. As a result, expectations of5

forest functions such as soil and water conservation and environmental protection have grown.
In fact, forest treatment has the potential to control the amount and timing of stream flow bymodifying the distribution and amount of evapotranspiration losses. Appropriate forest andwater management practices are useful methods to support new approaches to water
management that are in harmony with the environment. Although forest hydrologic research
has made considerable progress, few researches have been validated over a wide range ofconditions. We must conduct more research into developing forest and watershedmanagement techniques to maintain or improve water resources and put appropriate forest andwatershed management for water resources into practice.

KEY ISSUES
Global climate change issues
1. Trends in changing climate regime, especially climate extremes, are likely to be
impacting on landscapes ecosystems in different regions
2. Inter-annual and decadal distribution of rainfall as influenced by ENSO activity
Natural versus anthropogenic influences
3. Need to discriminate between what is ‘natural’ and what is human induced and should
be mitigated against
4. Geographical location predisposes countries to high “natural” rates of runoff and soil
erosion (including landslides), floods and droughts
5. Population pressures on land and water resource utilization
Land use and cover change issues
6. Remaining land conversions are likely to be in “sensitive” headwater areas, where land
use is converted for short-term economic gain
7. Land tenure issue and the conflicting interests of different land owners
8. Lack of political motivation to implement policies and sustainable land use
9. Impacts from infrastructure development in some regions are yet to be realized
10. Conservation and stewardship of land and water resources is lacking in all countries
regardless of socio-economic status
11. Widespread land conversion practices (including land and forest fire) such as
conversion to industrial forest plantation, oil palm and coffee may significantly affectrunoff and erosion

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Water supply and demand issues
12. Rural water demands will be mainly agricultural and only for minor domestic use
13. Urban water demands and pollution are increasing due to “mega-city” development
14. Long-term depletion of water storage capacity of soils due to erosion altershydrological regime and tends to intensify floods and droughts.
15. Eco-environmental water demand should be considered such as sustainable river flowetc.
Public education and awareness16. Increased agro-environmental education at schools and the general public
17. Lack of knowledge of the people about the complex interactions of water, sediments,
nutrients and land use (vegetation - cumulative watershed effects have given rise to
ecosystem degradation and unnecessary water related disasters)
18. Lack of government investment in research and monitoring of water related resourcesand disasters
19. Need for economic valuation of ecosystem services provided by land and water
resources and associated costs of their depletion

RECOMMENDATIONS
Global climate change issues
1. Consideration of the effects of predicted climate extremes (due to global warming andENSO) should be incorporated in future land management/practice options.
2. Improve predicted capability using combination of global climate models, long-termmonitoring records and where possible reconstructing paleo climate records (i.e. treerings, lake sediments, pollens etc.). To obtain high resolution paleo climatic records
where possible link to global research programmes such as IGBP.
Natural versus anthropogenic influences
3. There is a need to discriminate between natural and human induced effects so thatcounter measures can be targeted where they will have the greatest benefits forsustainability.
Land use and cover change issues
4. Appropriate regional and national policy/legislation should be formulated/enacted to7

regulate accelerated forest to agriculture, and agriculture to other land use conversions,currently prevailing in countries in Asia.
5. Use participatory processes to implement best management practices during land use
conversions
Water supply and demand issues
6. There is a need to incorporate water conservation and recycling in planning for the
long- term supply of water services to meet the increasing future water demand.
Public education and awareness7. Use participatory processes to educate people about the complex interactions of water,
sediments, nutrients and land use (cumulative watershed effects) when consideringresource allocation and application of mitigation practices.
8. There is a need for public investment for research and monitoring of water relatedresources and disasters and the government should provide the necessary budget for
this.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The participants of the 2002 TASAE express sincere appreciation to the TASAE
Organizing Committee chaired by Prof. Naoki Sakai for the opportunity to attend this seminar.
Special thanks are given to Dr. Hideo Hasegawa and all the staff of the Agricultural andForestry Research Center, University of Tsukuba for their kind, friendly support andhospitality throughout the Seminar. Without them, the effective running and the success of
the Seminar would have been impossible.
We would also like to thank Ms. Kyoko Shimizu and Ms. Noriko Nakajima for theirmost experienced interpreter skills and Ms. Teresa Arnuevo-Virtudazo for her secretarial
assistance in the smooth running of the Seminar. Through the team efforts of those named
and their many colleagues, cooperation and understanding between Japan and the otherparticipating countries has been enhanced.

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