THB337-billion plan in the pipeline to tackle Thailand’s flooding and drought issues

The massive plan for water resource management involves 63,589 projects that require total funding of 337.7 billion baht to implement in 2024.

General Prawit, acting as caretaker prime minister while PM Prayut Chan-o-cha was on an official trip to Belgium, gave his endorsement while chairing a meeting of the government subcommittees tasked with driving the water management master plan and the development of water resources.

Prawit attended the meeting through a videoconferencing system from his office at the Five Provinces Bordering Forest Preservation Foundation.
 

The plan calls for increasing the capacity of reservoirs by 1,400 million cubic metres to cover an area of 6.23 million rai (about 1 million hectares) to benefit 5.64 million households while protecting 5.37 million rai of residential and agricultural areas from severe flooding.

The plan is aimed at ensuring sufficient supplies of water for consumption and industrial production, dealing with flooding, and preserving and restoring the water resource ecosystems.

During the meeting, General Prawit instructed the Royal Irrigation Department and relevant state agencies to carefully study potential risk factors to prevent a delay in the plan’s implementation and an increase in funding needs.

The meeting also approved a project to improve the irrigation system along the lower section of the Chao Phraya River from Ayutthaya to Samut Prakan province on the eastern side, and from Ayutthaya to Samut Sakhon province on the western side. The goal is to speed up the release of water runoff into the sea to help alleviate severe inundations in flood-prone areas.