The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and AusAID, the Australian government's aid programme, will help the Water Resources and Environment Administration (WREA) to undertake an integrated water resource management support programme in Laos .

A memorandum of understanding was signed at a ceremony yesterday in Vientiane by WREA's Office Head, Ms Monemany Nhoybouakong, First Secretary of the Australian Embassy to Laos , Mr Simon Buckley, and ADB's Senior Water Resources Engineer, Mr Ian W. Makin.

Under the agreement, ADB will provide US$983,000, AusAID US$2.87 million and the Lao government US$371,000 to support four project components from 2010-12.

The first component covers capacity building for water resource management and supporting water strategy policy implementation in Laos .

The second component will help WREA to develop and implement integrated water resource management in the context of river basins, including dealing with large-scale water resource development projects, working across sectors and with communities, and the private and public sector.

This sub-project will focus on the development and testing of appropriate river basin institutional arrangements adapted to local conditions in selected pilot river basins, ultimately leading to river basin plans to be mainstreamed into government planning and investment decisions.

The third component involves national groundwater management; this sub-project will assist WREA with groundwater management practices to prepare an initial approach and action plan to manage groundwater systematically for sustainable use of the resource.

The fourth module will help the Water Resource Engineering Department (WRED) of the National University of Laos to prepare a strategy plan and detailed proposals for the provision of bachelor level qualifications in integrated water resource management.

This sub-project will initiate the retraining of WRED teaching staff and support in-house development of the strategic plan and proposals for future support.