The government has turned to a study on water management by the Crown Property Bureau (CPB) as a blueprint to prevent future disasters of flood and drought.
Implementing recommendations of the study on the Chao Phraya river basin which was conducted in 2000, will cost 100 billion baht over the next 25 years.
Deputy Prime Minister Kittiratt Na-Ranong, who chairs the Strategic Committee for Water Resource Management, has said the government will use the study as a guideline for water resource management.
The government would seek technical assistance from the Japan International Cooperation Agency, which also offers soft loans to Thailand to execute the scheme.
The National Economic and Social Development Board has been authorized to be the leading agency of Thailand in taking input from studies by other government agencies such as the Royal Irrigation Department.
The department has undertaken studies on water resource development in 25 basins _ including seven basins in the North, three in the Northeast, eight in the Central Plains and seven in the South.
The Chao Phraya basin, which is the focus of the bureau's concern, is the biggest basin in Thailand, covering 157,925 square kilometers or 30% of total land.
The study warns that without any serious efforts to better regulate water in this basin, people will face water shortage, floods, poor quality water. The natural resources, agricultural sector and Thai economy as a whole will suffer drastic impact, it adds.
When the CPB study was released in 2000, water shortage was projected to increase by 2.44 billion cubic meters at the time, to 6.6 billion cu m in another 10 years.
The CPB study proposes the implementation of the project in three steps: a five-year, short-term plan, a 15-year medium-term plan, and a 25-year long-term plan.
For the short term, it recommends land should be better utilized, better efficiency for water consumption is needed, more small water reservoirs be built and and existing ones including canals be dredged, more dams be constructed to protect economic areas and Bangkok.
The first phase will need 10 billion baht and is estimated to solve water shortage up to 2.4 billion cu m a year.
The medium-term plan includes building reservoirs for Pho, Mae Wong and Kwai Noi canals with a total budget 10.2 billion baht. This project is estimated to solve water shortage of 3.2 billion cu m a year.
The second proposal for the medium term is that the government should implement water management in the Kok-Ing-Nan river basins with a budget of 45 billion baht, and the water management of the Moei and Salween rivers as well as water at Bhumibol dam, with a budget of 20 billion baht.
The long-term plan is to solve water shortage of about 5.2 billion cu m a year.
This phase includes building new projects: Kaeng Sua Ten dam, Kiew Khor Ma dam and Mae Khan, with 13 billion baht budget.
The study also proposes reform of all agencies involved in water management, the establishment of a water fund because the government needs massive budget for the project, and the implementation of a scheme requiring farmers to pay for water usage in irrigation areas.
The CPB study also warns that without proper water resource management, damage from floods may reach 164 billion baht, double the damage caused by flooding in 1995.
The main problems on water resource management now, according to the CPB, include a lack of cooperation and the duplication of projects among related agencies, improper land utilization, and the construction of infrastructures which have become barriers to flood ways.
The 2000 study conducted by the Crown Property Bureau reveals that Thailand has had too many water management studies over the past 10 years, each one aimed at solving problems for each agency.
Efforts to launch schemes on water resource management have been plagued by conflicts of interest among politicians, a budget crunch and a lack of vision on the part of the various governments.
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