Vietnamese government organisation for water management establishes ties with SUBSOL and KWR

KWR leads the European Horizon 2020 SUBSOL project, which focuses on the international (market) introduction of so-called Subsurface Water Technologies: concepts aimed at bettering the management of groundwater and thereby strongly improving the provision of freshwater in coastal areas. Groundwater management and the coastal freshwater provision are also high on the agenda of NAWAPI, the National Center for Water Resources Planning and Investigation, which is part of the Vietnam Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment. The water provision in Vietnam makes significant use of groundwater, which in the case of that country’s deltas is also becoming scarcer and its quality under threat.

Letter of Support

On 24 February, during the course of a working visit to the Netherlands and Germany, NAWAPI delegation spent the morning visiting KWR. Representatives of KWR, NAWAPI and the German BGR (Bundesanstalt für Geowissenschaften und Rohstoffe), which is involved with both NAWAPI and SUBSOL, discussed the opportunities for European-Vietnamese collaboration and knowledge exchange. To ratify their mutual support, Dr. Tong Ngoc Thanh, Director General of NAWAPI, and KWR CEO Prof. Dr. W. van Vierssen signed a Letter of Support, which now makes NAWAPI an Associate Partner of SUBSOL.

Dr. Tong Ngoc Thanh, Director General of NAWAPI, and KWR CEO Prof. Dr. W. van Vierssen sign the Letter of Support.

Red River and Mekong River Deltas

‘The future collaboration between Vietnam, SUBSOL and other European partners will focus primarily on knowledge exchange in the field of sustainable groundwater management and artificial recharge in the deltas of Vietnam’s Red and Mekong rivers,’ says NAWAPI’s Dr. Tong Ngoc Thanh.

The NAWAPI delegation visits KWR.