Integrated Waterscape Management in Vietnam’s Central Highlands

Southeast Asia probably isn’t the first place you think of when it comes to coffee production, but trade liberalization has made Vietnam the world’s second largest exporter of our favorite morning pick-me-up. Along with pepper and (increasingly) cocoa, this commodity is contributing to the country’s economic development. Unfortunately, harmful agricultural practices and the unchecked depletion of natural resources associated with these commodities pose serious challenges for sustainable production in Vietnam’s central highlands.

Vietnam is among the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change; extreme weather incidents, droughts and flooding in coastal areas threaten the livelihoods and communities of millions of Vietnamese. Likewise, the coffee industry will likely suffer from climate-related instability in its production chain and, thus, has a serious interest in mitigating climate change. At the same time, the clearing of forests for coffee plantations has contributed to the loss of habitats for Vietnam’s diverse wildlife and the erosion of exposed soil on the highland’s steep slopes. These environmental issues are not only threats to the natural world, but to the well-being of local people as well.

Coffee beans harvested from a Vietnamese plantation. Photo: Jeves Sinclair on Flickr

Take water as an example: agricultural activity has depleted groundwater reserves, and inequitable access to this limited resource between farming groups (for instance, between upstream and downstream users) contributes to social and ethnic tensions. The benefits of an expanding coffee industry are already distributed along ethnic lines. The indigenous Ede communities in the central highlands—who long preserved their customs despite Vietnam’s economic development and modernization—have been inundated by Kinh farmers from the coastal lowlands. The Kinh have enjoyed preferential treatment from the government and have even encouraged by the administration to move to the area. Social dynamics between these groups have serious implications for resource use and the well-being of rural Vietnamese coffee growers and, therefore, must be addressed as part of a larger industry sustainability initiative.

These diverse consequences associated with the production of export crops need to be addressed through inclusive, integrated and sustainable systems. Thinking about the highlands from a landscape perspective may help stakeholders do just that.

Some programs that encourage responsible agricultural production in Vietnam are already underway, particularly within the private sector. Several international companies are supporting certification standards for quality and sustainability (for example, UTZ Certified and the Common Code for the Coffee Community Association), while others are initiating public-private partnerships to strengthen long-term development of sustainable production. The government of Vietnam is a vital player in these initiatives because it owns the majority of the country’s land and—through the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development—oversees agricultural policy. The coordinating power of the Vietnamese government would be instrumental to the success of a landscape approach.

Right now, the range of initiatives aimed at sustainability lack the large-scale focus or integration needed to tackle systemic challenges. The Sustainable Land and Water Program—launched in February at The Hague as a program to bring together landscape stakeholders to address critical risks to tropical sourcing regions—has the potential to facilitate a more robust approach. By bringing together the private sector, government, farmers and communities, the SLWP could add value to the existing sustainability initiatives and implement larger governance and finance frameworks. Some concrete examples of what these efforts could look like include mapping stakeholders and resources in the central highlands, improving the inclusion of ethnic minorities in agricultural markets and establishing capacity-building trainings to increase the adoption of climate-smart agricultural practices in the region. These are only possibilities when stakeholders can come together and explore their feasibility, but this landscape model has a lot of potential.