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BANGKOK — Sizzling temperatures and a prolonged drought in Thailand have come to the rescue of China, often accused by Thai environmentalists of disrupting the water flow in the Mekong River due to the dams that it is building on its upper reaches.

Numerous forest fires in Thailand's northern regions have also helped take the heat off Beijing. The first three months of 2004 have seen close to 60,000 hectares of parched forests in provinces such as Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai go up in flames.

Thailand's recent rainfall pattern provides the best evidence to explain why this South-east Asian country is facing a looming water crisis, say international water and environment experts.

But it is a phenomenon not exclusive to this country, since Laos and Cambodia, two of its neighbours that also share the waters of the Mekong River, are just as affected. The 4,880-Mekong river flows from Tibet, downstream into mainland South-east Asia and out into the South China Sea after Vietnam.

"The wet season started late and ended early last year. This is why rivers such as the Mekong are experiencing low water levels," Ian Campbell, senior environmentalist at the Mekong River Commission (MRC), a Phnom Penh-based inter-government agency, told IPS.

The first two months of the rainy season - June and July - were dry spells. The same was true from October through November, the tail end of the monsoon season.

"If the frequency of this pattern is increasing, then there is a case to be made that it is the result of climate change than placing blame on dams," Robert Mather, head of the Thai arm of the World Wildlife Fund, said in an interview.

This shift in weather could also result in concentrated rainfall, with regions experiencing shorter, more intense rain, consequently leading to more floods, he added.

The MRC released data over the weekend to illustrate how low rainfall had been in 16 sites across the Mekong River's basin in 2003. Between October and December, the sites received less rain than in 1998 and in 2000. According to this note, 1992 had seen the lowest amount of rain occurring the last three months of the annual rainy season.

What is more, added the MRC, "Dryer than usual conditions appear to have persisted in the first half of 2004."

Till such confirmation from the MRC, which was set up to coordinate use of the Mekong River by the four downstream countries, China had been accused of triggering the low water levels in the river, resulting in large sand dunes appearing in midstream.

The four downstream countries that are MRC members include Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. But China and Burma, two upstream countries that also share the Mekong River, are not members of the MRC and are instead observers.

"We have been surprised by statements that the Chinese dams have been held responsible for the low water levels along the Mekong," said Campbell. "These dams are hydro dams and are quite small, unlike dams meant to hold water for irrigation."

The MRC note explains that the Chinese hydropower dams release all the water they retain, "although usually with a different pattern on flow to the natural river".

Hydropower dams usually store 'excess' water in the wet season and release them during the dry season to help with water supply needed, "so the expected impact of Manwan and Dachaoshan dams would be to increase the dry season flows rather than decrease them".

However, he said, the Chinese dams have been contributing to varying levels of water flow along the Mekong River, a phenomenon that downstream communities say has hurt fishing and other river-dependent livelihood.

The Chinese currently have two dams - the Manwan and Dachaosan - on the Lancang River, as the upper reaches of the Mekong are called. A much larger one, the Xiaowan Dam, is under construction.

The MRC confirmed that data on river height has become "irregular" due to the Manwan dam, which started generating power in 1993, and will impact on fish and other aquatic life in the river.

Water flowing from China only contributes to 20 percent of the Mekong's volume of water that reaches the river basin countries, while the remaining 80 percent is fed from water sources in Laos. However, some MRC officials have also been quoted as saying that the proportion coming from China reaches 50 to 70 per cent in the dry season, he said.

Meantime, the images seen in drought-hit areas include widening riverbanks, shallow water levels and fishermen lamenting at low fish stocks along the Mekong and other rivers in Thailand.

Already, farmers in Thailand's rice basins are feeling the heat of such a depleted resource. Close to 400,000 hectares of agricultural land have been affected in the country's north and north-east regions, the English-language 'Bangkok Post' newspaper.

The impact of the drought will be felt by four million people in 47 of Thailand's 76 provinces who depend on agriculture there for their livelihood, the paper added.

In early 1999, some six million people were affected when the country was scorched by its worst dry spell in years.

In an effort to stave off a further drain on the already diminished water resources, the irrigation department has urged farmers in the central regions to ditch plans of going ahead with planting a third crop of rice this year.

Thailand is the world's leading rice exporter, shipping close to 7.5 million tonnes every year to foreign markets, states the Food and Agriculture Organisation, the Rome-based U.N. agency.

Traditionally, Thai farmers begin planting their second rice crop between February and March following the first harvest that comes with the end of the rainy season.

"The government needs to acknowledge this reality and start planning for such shifts in the weather," asserts WWF's Mather. "There are few mechanisms in place to deal with the impact of the drought."

It is too late to tell farmers now, when faced with a water crisis, that they should not plant a third crop, he added. "That is a knee-jerk reaction." (END/Copyright IPS)