Ho Chi Minh City and Holland ’s Rotterdam city are set to sign a
new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that will advance cooperation
between the two sides in climate change adaptation.
The
development follows the city submitting a comprehensive climate change
adaptation strategy at a meeting held between the two sides on April 8.
The established climate adaptation strategy is the start of a new
phase for which Rotterdam has been explicitly requested to continue
to play a role, especially when it comes to securing responsibilities
and increasing the knowledge of the various government agencies, said
Rotterdam Deputy Mayor Alexandra van Huffelen.
The cooperation
agreement will formalise this, said Huffelen, who will sign the new MoU
on behalf of the Rotterdam , the Dutch Consulate in HCM City said
in a press release.
HCM City is one of the cities in the
knowledge network Connecting Delta Cities (CDC) and the completed
strategy will be shares with CDC member cities, it said.
Delta
cities are to some extent similar throughout the world. More and more
people are living in these areas, there is a need for more space and the
cities are prone to the sea level rise because of their location.
Van Huffelen said the strategy for HCM City could, therefore
serve as a blueprint for an integrated approach to the climate issues in
delta cities around the world.
The problems city residents
experience and the risks they face will only increase as a result of the
predicted rising sea level, increased water discharge from rivers and
rising temperatures, the press release noted.
Since its
population and economy are growing rapidly at the same time, HCM
City has been expanding towards flood prone areas along the coast.
A
third of the city is already exposed to flooding at present. The city’s
expansion and urbanisation is bound to continue, given its attraction
as a location to move to, and its population has already doubled in the
past 25 years.-VNA