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WATER POLITICS

Via the July 2013 issue of Asia Policy, a comprehensive look at water security in the Himalaya region.   As the journal examines, the scramble for control of natural resources to support economic and population growth, combined with the uncertain effects of climate change on the Tibetan Plateau, is raising tensions in Asia over Himalayan water resources. Ten of the region’s largest and longest rivers (the Amu Darya, Brahmaputra, Ganges, Indus, Irrawaddy, Mekong, Salween, Tarim, Yangtze, and Yellow) originate in the Himalayas. These rivers help provide water, food, and energy for nearly 4 billion people in China and across South and Southeast Asia—nearly half of the world’s population. However, depletion and diversion of these transborder resources to meet growing industrial, agricultural, and urban demands have the potential to trigger far-reaching economic, social, and environmental challenges.

The lack of comprehensive and effective regional frameworks for cooperation hinders sustainable management of these waterways. China, which controls the headwaters of these rivers, has an enormous need for Himalayan water to satisfy economic and energy demands but has little incentive to participate in formal water-sharing and water-management agreements with its neighbors. China’s dam-building and water-diversion projects are a source of major concern to the countries downstream, which often complain about Beijing’s lack of transparency and reluctance to share information. Although managing water-sharing relations with China might be the most prominent challenge, cooperation is not much easier at the middle and lower reaches of the rivers. Collaboration in South and Southeast Asia is frequently frustrated by competing national interests, economic priorities, political disputes, and weak regional organizations. In addition to the environmental impacts of man-made diversion projects and unsustainable freshwater usage, there is also inadequate cooperation on scientific research to understand and prepare for the effects of climate change on the region’s water supplies.

One of the essays – by Jennifer Turner – looks at how the confluence of three factors—China’s increasing demand for hydroelectric power, water scarcity, and the transboundary nature of rivers—are raising tensions in the great Himalayan watershed:

The four-character Chinese idiom “benefiting from the gifts of nature” (de tian du hou) captures China’s riparian advantage in the great Himalayan watershed. In Mother Nature’s luck of the draw, China is the big winner; many of the largest rivers in the Himalayan watershed originate in the glaciers of Tibet. The Yellow, Yangtze, Mekong, Brahmaputra, Salween, Sutlej, and Indus rivers provide water to 1.5 billion people from the mountains in Tibet down to deltas in Bangladesh, China, India, Myanmar, Pakistan, and Vietnam. As the upstream power, China has the ability to control the quality and flow of water that reaches its downstream neighbors.

The confluence of three factors—China’s increasing demand for hydroelectric power, water scarcity, and the transboundary nature of rivers—are raising tensions in the great Himalayan watershed. China’s hunger for energy to build cities and fuel industries, while at the same time reducing greenhouse gas emissions, has sparked a new wave of planning for dozens of mega-dams along the mainstreams of these transboundary rivers. Yet Beijing’s lack of transparency about its dam-building projects and disinterest in formally cooperating or engaging with the lower riparian states in multilateral forums frustrate its downstream neighbors, which notably are also damming the same rivers for electricity generation.

The region desperately needs institutionalized water-sharing agreements    and    practices    because    countries    are    increasingly overdeveloping and wasting scarce freshwater resources. This overuse is occurring against the backdrop of climate change’s unknown effects on the Himalayan river basins. The key challenge to the region’s water-sharing efforts is the acute power imbalance between China and its neighbors—China not only controls the headwaters of these rivers but is also the most powerful state in the region, economically and militarily.

Thus, Beijing has little incentive to enter into formal cooperative water agreements with its weaker downstream neighbors.

This essay first discusses how China’s rising demand for both energy and freshwater are driving the dam-building projects that endanger the flow and water quality of rivers feeding the downstream countries of South and Southeast Asia. It then considers how China’s aversion to formal water-sharing agreements is frustrating its neighbors. Although no entity can force China to cooperate, more could be done to fill the information gap on the broader costs of dam building. The essay concludes by proposing a “carrot and stick” approach that would encourage Chinese policymakers to sustainably develop the upstream waters—not simply to benefit downstream countries but to protect China’s own water security.

The Ripple Effect of China’s Water Needs

The domestic implications of China’s energy demand. China’s voracious appetite for energy continues to grow. The International Energy Agency forecasts that the country’s energy demand will rise by 60% from 2012 to 2035.1 As smog increasingly blankets Chinese cities, Chinese citizens are demanding more aggressive action from the government to clean the air. Beijing has set targets to secure 15% of the country’s energy from non–fossil fuel sources by 2020, with 9% projected to come from hydroelectric power. In particular, Chinese leaders recognize the need to move away from coal, which currently supplies 70% of the country’s electricity. To reach this goal, China will need to double its output of hydroelectric power.

This demand for hydroelectric power as an alternative to coal is problematic because China is a water-stressed nation. Although water is abundant in absolute terms, the country’s per capita freshwater resources are only 2,093 cubic meters, one-quarter of the global average.3 According to a survey released by the Chinese Ministry of Water Resources in March 2013, an alarming 23,000 rivers in the country have disappeared entirely in just the past 60 years.4 Rapid urbanization and industrialization have only accentuated this water scarcity. By 2025, an estimated 350 million people—roughly equivalent to the entire U.S. population—will be added to China’s urban population.5 Not only are massive amounts of resources required to build cities, but urbanites consume more energy. Furthermore, both energy production and agriculture are highly water-intensive in China: coal production, for example, accounts for 20% of the nation’s water use, and agriculture constitutes 65%.

To meet the hydropower goals of the twelfth five-year plan, the central government has set a target of constructing 60 medium and large dams by 2016, primarily focused on rivers flowing out of the Himalayas into South and Southeast Asia. Given that the melt water from the 50,000 glaciers situated in the Hindu Kush and Himalayan mountain ranges fill the aquifers and water tables of the river basins throughout the region, the proposed dams threaten the water security of downstream nations and increase tension with China.
Southeast Asia’s downstream lament. China began building the first series of dams on the Mekong River in 1986. Since then, Chinese dams have lowered water levels, disrupted sediment flows, and damaged the health of fisheries in Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. In Thailand, fishermen along the border with Laos have reported that the river has become unpredictable since China began upstream dam construction.7 Likewise, dams have had a significant impact on downstream agriculture. The Mekong River Delta, for example, supplies water for 50% of Vietnam’s rice crop, which provides 16% of the country’s annual GDP.8 During a severe drought in 2011, lower Mekong conservationists claimed that China was not releasing enough water, worsening drought conditions.9

According to Ed Grumbine, a biodiversity specialist at China’s Kunming Institute of Botany, “there will be significant impacts from the cumulative operation of China’s hydropower dams.”10 The leaders of several Southeast Asian countries have protested China’s dismissal of the alleged negative downstream effects from its dam-building activities. On the sidelines of the 2012 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Russia, for example, Vietnamese president Truong Tan Sang alluded to this issue, stating that “dam construction and stream adjustments by some countries in upstream rivers constitute a growing concern for many countries and implicitly impinge on relations between relevant countries.”11 Likewise, the former Cambodian minister for transport and public works, Khy Tanglim, once commented that Chinese leaders “will work for their own country. We are downstream, so we suffer all the negative consequences. If there is no more water for us, no more fish, no more vegetation, this is a big disaster.”

To address water security, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam created the intergovernmental Mekong River Commission (MRC) in 1995 to jointly develop their shared water resources. China became a dialogue partner of the MRC in 1996, but officials have refused to sign the Mekong Agreement to become a full-fledged member. Southeast Asian countries continue to urge China to participate fully in the MRC. Even though a 2010 MRC agreement commits China to sending water-level data from its Jinghong and Manwan dams, Beijing refuses to release key data on water quality, pollution, and irrigation usage. China’s full membership would create a forum in which these states could more effectively advocate for their water rights and pressure Beijing to more seriously consider the downstream implications of dam development.

Anger in South Asia.

Thus far, China has proposed seven dams on the main channel of the Brahmaputra River, the lifeline for farmers in India and Bangladesh. China recently approved construction of three new hydropower dams on the middle reaches of the river, ending a two-year freeze on new projects amid concerns from India and environmental groups. The State Council’s energy strategy for the twelfth five-year plan period (2011–15) stated that the government “will push forward vigorously the hydropower base construction” on the middle reaches of the Brahmaputra.

China insists that the dams it is building are “run of the river,” which operate on the flow of the river without modifying upstream storage, but New Delhi harbors fears that Beijing may eventually divert additional water from transboundary rivers to its dry northern regions to supply the centers of China’s coal and grain production. The plan is allegedly part of the proposed western route of the South-North Water Transfer Project, which is scheduled for completion by 2050.13 The project’s east and central canals are already in progress, and all three routes will move nearly 36 billion cubic meters of water per year from the Yangtze River in southern China to the Yellow River Basin in the arid northern part of the country.14
Chinese officials and analysts have downplayed the likelihood of the western diversion due to the difficult terrain and associated technical challenges. Despite this reassurance, angry Indian politicians and activists have galvanized public opposition. To moderate the escalating political tension, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India issued a statement on August 4, 2011, stating that Chinese leaders had assured him that no such plans were imminent. Although China does provide limited hydrological and flood data to India through a memorandum of understanding renewed in May 2012, Singh has emphasized the need for a joint mechanism for sharing information on transboundary projects. China is currently the only country with which India shares a major transboundary river without a formal water-sharing agreement. The Indian leadership’s opposition to China’s dams could also stem from concerns that these projects threaten India’s own expansive hydropower development plans in the Himalayan Basin, where nearly 300 dams are planned on the Brahmaputra, Ganges, and Indus rivers. These dams, which could help double the country’s hydropower by 2030 and stabilize the power supply, highlight how water serves the energy sector in India as well as China.

The Need for Formal Cooperation

In addition to China’s lack of transparency, its resistance to entering into formal water-sharing agreements frustrates the lower riparian states. Thus far, China’s gestures toward water cooperation have been mainly rhetorical. Since 1997, China has declined to sign a UN water-sharing treaty that would apply to the thirteen major transnational rivers within its territory. Instead, China has consistently preferred to negotiate with countries bilaterally rather than multilaterally, thus allowing itself maximum maneuverability and facilitating Beijing’s preference for informal agreements. China does not have a single water-sharing treaty with any of its neighboring countries. Accentuated by the unpredictable effects of climate change, China’s disinterest in binding agreements has increased friction between China’s and its riparian neighbors.

The lower riparian states are partly to blame for this situation. China has every incentive to deal with countries bilaterally because infighting among member states has politically weakened the regional institutions of Southeast and South Asia—namely, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). Because ASEAN operates by consensus, the political and socioeconomic diversity of its member states inherently undermines the organization’s effectiveness. ASEAN’s ten countries—Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam—are rarely able to find common ground on a wide range of issues, including climate change and water security. By comparison, SAARC, which comprises Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka, makes ASEAN look like a harmonious family. Specifically, strong mistrust between India and Pakistan has rendered the institution feckless. Without a united front, regional institutions such as ASEAN and SAARC cannot properly mobilize their political capital, thus weakening their ability to bring China to the negotiating table.

Solutions

To mitigate major conflicts over water originating in the Himalayas, China must reconsider the implications of its dam-development policies, both within and outside its borders. To do this, China will need to increase the transparency and rigor of environmental and social impact assessments prior to project construction. Other Asian countries also have a role to play, as they must put aside bilateral disputes, increase energy efficiency at home, and seek a unified stance toward Chinese dam development upstream. Although little is known about the long-term impacts of climate change on the Himalayan watershed, there are clear signs that water levels are dropping. Thus, it is vital that the region agrees on frameworks for water sharing and significantly improves efficiency in water and energy management.

Within its borders, China’s push to expand energy efficiency initiatives; make coal use more costly through consumption caps, trading, and taxes; and increase wind and solar energy development will help lessen the pressure on water resources from energy demands. Chinese policymakers also need to enforce existing targets and laws that aim to better manage water. Improving efficiency entails fostering a better understanding of the water-energy-food nexus and creating national consciousness of water and energy conservation through better enforced regulations and public awareness campaigns.

Internationally, China needs to show greater engagement in multilateral venues. For example, it could join the MRC as a full-fledged member rather than remaining a dialogue partner that only participates when advantageous. In South Asia, it is time for China to sign a water treaty with India. To build trust, Beijing also needs to make a greater effort to improve transparency in data-sharing and inform downstream neighbors of its dam-construction plans. In addition, China should take the lead in widening regional discussions about water security beyond hydroelectric power to include renewable forms of energy such as solar and wind.

As an upstream country, it is not necessarily in China’s best interest to cooperate on these issues, and in the near term Beijing is unlikely to formally enter into any water-sharing agreements. If countries hope to engage with China, they will need to utilize a “carrot and stick” approach. The carrot will require initiatives that clearly demonstrate the economic benefits of responsible dam planning. There are many short-term studies and exchange programs targeting the Mekong and other rivers in the Himalayan Basin, yet few deeply engage Chinese researchers, hydropower companies, banks, and NGOs. The key to promoting sustainable development of the rivers is to broaden engagement with these stakeholders.

This will require introducing biodiversity and water security as compelling factors in the economic calculus of dam building. For example, concern for their global reputation has led some Chinese hydropower companies to start adopting the Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Protocol, an enhanced sustainability assessment tool used to guide performance of hydropower companies. On the stick side, regional organizations such as ASEAN and SAARC must put their bilateral agendas on the backburner to be cohesive multilaterally.

Pressure will need to come from inside China as well. Chinese citizens and civil society groups should continue to press companies and the government for greater transparency using open information tools. Chinese citizens, NGOs, and the news media have recently demonstrated that they can effectively pressure the government to improve environmental protection. When smog blanketed Beijing and much of northern China in December 2012 and early 2013, Chinese citizens broadcast their frustration widely on social media. Some Chinese NGOs even rented out personal air- quality monitors to have citizens post the registered “hazardous” readings online alongside official government air-quality reports that listed the air pollution as “fair” or “moderate.” The Chinese media was also highly critical of the government’s failure to lessen the choking pollution. The criticism online and harsh news media reporting prompted the government to make policy changes that included expanded monitoring and reporting of air pollutants, stricter targets for cutting coal use, and more stringent auto- emission standards. Thus, there appears to be an avenue for civic action, within bounds, to affect policy. Nascent public-interest lawsuits against polluters are also opening new doors for citizens, lawyers, and NGOs to strengthen environmental law enforcement.

Currently, the way in which water is being used outpaces natural replenishment rates. The United Nations has declared this year the “international year of water cooperation.” It is time for China to take the lead before its regional relationships run dry. Chinese policymakers need to remember that if they hope to carve out a harmonious regional environment that is ideal for further economic development, China needs to be a good neighbor.