SE Asia's rice bowls under water

Nirmal Ghosh (The Straits Times),
The Asia News Network | Fri, 10/07/2011

The governments of Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam are stepping up efforts to tackle the region's worst flooding in decades, even as a new tropical storm threatens to worsen the crisis.

About 1.5 million ha of padi fields - about the size of 21 Singapores - have been damaged or are at risk from floods exacerbated by consecutive tropical storms and a typhoon since Sept 26.

Thailand, the world's biggest rice exporter, has seen around 1 million ha of padi fields submerged.

In Vietnam, the No. 2 rice producer in the world, 11 people have been reported killed and more than 20,000 houses and some 5,000ha of rice fields flooded since Monday.

State-controlled media in Laos reported that 23 people have died and some 60,000ha of rice crops destroyed since June.

Cambodia is as badly hit as its neighbors, with 167 deaths reported and more than 215,000 families affected. Some 100,000ha of rice crops have been destroyed.

"Meteorologists have indicated that flooding in some of these countries is the worst in 50 years," a bulletin from the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Unocha) said yesterday.

Thailand's Commerce Minister Kittirat Na Ranong has said that the floods since July could cost the country up to 30 billion baht (US$970 million). The nationwide death toll hit 244 yesterday.

In central Ayutthaya province, floods hit the 500-year-old Chaiwatthanaram temple - a World Heritage site - and about 43 factories, most of them Japanese ventures, in an industrial estate.

Mr Ishii Nobuyuki, secretary-general of the Japanese Chamber of Commerce, said four or five of its members had been affected and also several other Japanese firms that were not its members.

The affected factories have suspended operations because of the flooding and disruptions to the supply chain, he said.

Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra inspected the flood-ravaged province by helicopter yesterday.

A main highway to the north was cut off by flood waters and all bus services were suspended. The army has deployed helicopters to carry relief supplies to affected communities, including in central and northern Thailand.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Thani Thongpakhdi said there had been no appeal for international aid, though any aid from friendly countries was welcome.

The Unocha bulletin said that food, drinking water and basic medication are the most needed.

Cambodia made at least one direct appeal for aid to Singapore-based Mercy Relief.

"The current state of calamity has greatly stretched our resources," wrote Mr Ly Thuch, a senior minister and head of the country's national committee for disaster management, in a letter to the agency.

Mercy Relief said a five-man team will leave for Cambodia this morning with 10 bicycle-powered water filtration systems. It also said it bought 20 tonnes of rice in Cambodia to be distributed to affected communities.

Following a 45-minute video conference with the Cambodian minister, Mercy Relief's chief executive officer Hassan Ahmad said: "The current floods are larger in scale compared with the major ones in 2000. We need to get to the victims as soon as possible to cater to their survival needs and prevent further exposure to the natural elements or loss of lives."

The agency would deliver S$56,000 (US$43,250) worth of relief supplies in its first tranche of aid, he said.

Speaking to The Straits Times in a phone interview, Mr Ly Thuch said: "More than 1,000 schools are closed and the start of the new school year has had to be postponed. Roads and bridges are washed out.

"It has now been two months of floods and we fear a lot of this rice crop has been lost, and it will be difficult for poor people to recover."