On 1th, July 2016, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) organized a project workshop for the Water Accounting for Vietnam study. This project fostered by ADB was a collaboration between UNESCO-IHE, The Netherlands and institutions and agencies from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MONRE). The Institute of Water Resources Planning (IWRP) led by Mr. Thai Gia Khanh, Deputy Director General participated as a local research partner. Participants to the workshop included representatives from ADB, The World Bank, UNESCO, Winrock International, Vietnam National University, Hanoi (VNU), Center for Water Resources Planning and Investigation, Vietnam Water Partnership (VNWP).

Water Accounting is a new tool that has been recently developed by UNESCO-IHE, FAO and the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in Laos that provides key input data on available water resources (www.wateraccounting.org). Water Accounting also describes the services and benefits from water consumption. It is proposed to prepare the water accounts for the 15 major river basins of Vietnam using this new procedure, and utilize this data set to refine the national water resources plan of Vietnam. ADB has recently requested UNESCO-IHE to take the lead in the execution of this study.

During this workshop, Mr. Ha Thanh Lan, Head of Training and International Cooperation at IWRP had a presentation on “Inclusion of remote sensing and numerical modelling in water resources planning and disaster management”. The presentation elaborated IWRP’s contributions to the study as well as presenting the Institute’s effort in pioneering the application of satellite technology and global data source to enhance water resource management and to ensure an informed decision making process.