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