Govt to set up flood center

The centre will be supervised by the Water and Flood Management Committee (WFMC), and will prepare easy-to-understand statements for the public. 

“All relevant information from relevant authorities such as the Meteorological Department, the Royal Irrigation Department and the Water Resources Department must be submitted to the WFMC, which will have a centre to analyse the information and develop the database,” Dr Anond Snidvongs said in his capacity as a WFMC member. Dr Anond also heads the Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency, a public organisation.

Science Minister Plodprasob Surassawadee and Nivatthamrong Boonsongpaisal were assigned to work on setting up the centre, Anond said. 

The plan was announced after the WFMC convened a meeting yesterday, during which Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra made an official appearance. “I wanted to check the progress of assignments I’d given earlier. Also, overall, I’ve noticed that relevant information is not well integrated yet,” she said later. 

The prime minister said that from now on, all relevant agencies must also send representatives to help with the analysis and interpretation of information. 

Bangkok and parts of central Thailand were hit by a crippling flood crisis late last year that caused hundreds of deaths, swamped major industrial estates and forced millions out of their homes. Massive economic damage was done. 

The government has approved a huge budget in a bid to reduce flood threats. The WFMC, which was established in the wake of last year’s crisis, has a key mission to prevent flood disasters. 

“We have already paid Bt120 billion for many projects related to flood prevention and remedial actions,” Yingluck said. 

Plodprasop said the Bt120 billion went on the dredging of waterways, road repairs, dam repairs, developing databases, improving an early-warning system, taking aerial pictures of the landscape, etc.

The government has also approved about Bt350 billion for related projects. Of this, Bt24 billion will be spent on raising the height of roads so they can also be used as flood embankments.

Plodprasop said the flood-prevention work had gone well. 

“Some amounts of the budget will go to reforestation efforts,” the minister said. 

Anond said that Yingluck would convene another meeting on April 30 to follow up on some delayed projects, notably ones handled by the Transport Ministry. 

“Because of complicated procedures and urgent tasks involved, many government agencies have had difficulty finding constructors,” he said.

The Science Ministry’s project to take aerial pictures to determine the elevation level of each area had also been delayed. 

However, Anond said officials were satisfied with the early-warning system in the wake of last week’s tsunami alert. “But we plan to improve the early-warning system further. We are considering alerts to people via short-message services too,” he said.

In a separate interview, Yingluck said relevant agencies would try to tackle communication network failures during crises. Yingluck said the government was considering installing a closed-circuit TV system for the purpose of monitoring water levels also. 

The PM said she planned to learn from China’s flood- and water-management models and would apply useful concepts in Thailand.