The United States on Thursday announced a three-year programme to help countries in the Mekong River basin adapt to the impact of climate change on water resources, food security and livelihoods. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made the pledge at a Hanoi meet with Southeast Asian countries of the lower Mekong region, whose waterway is also under threat from rapid economic development and expanding populations. "Managing this resource and defending it against threats like climate change and infectious disease is a transnational challenge," she told the foreign ministers of Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. "Regional cooperation is essential to meeting that challenge, to preserving the ecological diversity and fertility of the Mekong region." The meeting was the first between the five ministers since they launched the Lower Mekong Initiative (LMI) in Thailand a year ago to develop cooperation on environment, health, education and infrastructure issues in the Mekong region.

See the AFP story

No comments.