Cambodia canal’s impact on Mekong questioned
Cambodia should share a feasibility study on the impact of a planned China-backed canal that would divert water from the rice-growing floodplains of Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, said the body overseeing the transnational river.
After months of uncertainty, Phnom Penh last week signed a deal with China to develop the Funan Techo Canal when President Xi Jinping visited Cambodia as part of a tour of Southeast Asia.
It was Beijing’s first explicit public commitment to the project, giving state-controlled construction giant China Communications Construction Company a 49 percent stake through a subsidiary, but also linking Chinese support to the “sustainability” of the project.
The Secretariat of the intergovernmental Mekong River Commission that coordinates the sustainable development of Southeast Asia’s longest river said it had so far received from Cambodia only “basic information” on the project.
Delicate ecology
“We hope that further details, including the feasibility study report and other relevant reports, will be provided,” the Commission said in a statement to Reuters this week.
That would be needed “to ensure that any potential implications for the broader Mekong Basin are fully considered,” it added.
The canal has already created concern among environmentalists who say it could further harm the delicate ecology of the Mekong Delta.
