Mekong - U.S. Partnership
A Climate Action Plan for the city of Lao Cai has been approved by the People’s Provincial Committee and was formally announced on September 9. The Action Plan outlines eleven key actions that will help the city address challenges stemming from urbanization and build resilience to climate change. These actions range from ones targeting agents and institutions, such as improving the capacity of weather forecasting and disaster warning, to those that target infrastructure and ecosystems, such as investing in drainage and solid-waste processing systems.
For each of the action items, the plan identifies the lead and coordinating agencies responsible for implementation as well as sources of funding, including from local, national, and external sources. With the approval of the Action Plan, agencies and departments throughout the city will now work to integrate these actions into their own one and five year plans. Mr. Mai Dinh Dinh, the Director of the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment praised the plan, saying that this “commits Lao Cai to working directly to address climate change through 2020.”
The Action Plan was developed through a collaborative process as part of the USAID-funded Mekong – Building Climate Resilience in Asian Cities program (M-BRACE), which is being implemented by the Institute for Social and Environmental Transition (ISET) and the Vietnam National Institute for Science and Technology Policy and Strategy Studies (NISTPASS). The Action Plan builds on knowledge and capacity generated through a Vulnerability Assessment, a series of Shared Learning Dialogues, and a intervention projects targeting key areas of vulnerability.
Source: USAID/RDMA Regional Environment Office Weekly Update
