Calls to fence off RID from politicians

The Royal Irrigation Department (RID) must be reformed and protected from political interference to ensure effective water management, engineers said yesterday.

The experts made the comments at an Engineering Institute of Thailand (EIT) seminar, after allegations emerged that political meddling was partly to blame for the current drought, as water in dams is kept at low levels under government policy following the disastrous 2011 floods.

Some critics say the RID came under political pressure to discharge water from dams to feed rice shoots, grown in response to the Yingluck Shinawatra government’s rice-pledging scheme, leaving inadequate water reserves.

Thongchai Pansawat, an adviser to the Environmental Engineering Association of Thailand, said politicians must not make decisions on engineering matters.

Suwattana Jittaladakorn, an adviser to EIT’s water engineering subcommittee, also said politicians should steer clear of water management, as they only consider short-term gains instead of longterm consequences.

He said the RID only focused on large water containment projects, such as the Mae Wong dam, despite the presence of numerous small reservoirs across the country. The RID must look into how effectively this water can be used rather than focusing on building new projects, he said.

A representative of the Chao Phraya River basin villagers, Adisak Janthavichanuwong, said residents had earlier been warned to stop off-season rice cultivation, until they found irrigation water was still flowing. “Villagers then lost trust in the authorities and started planting paddies and hoarding water supplies,” he said.

Thongplew Kongjun, director of the RID’s Office of Water Management and Hydrology, said water reserves in May were 600 million cubic metre above the level of that of May last year. As efforts were made to urge farmers to stop growing off-season rice crops, the RID was confident there would be sufficient water for irrigation, he said.

However, farmers did not follow the plan as they tried to hoard water, causing the water supply to plunge lower than the level earlier estimated, he said.