Name – Nyi Linn Maung
Grade – M1 student in Kawasaki Research
Group, The University of Tokyo
During my stay in Myanmar
for both of my research and meetings with different departments of Myanmar
government, it was a great time for me as of having a chance to meet with my
family and get to know current relationships and future collaborations between
the two nations. As I am originally from Myanmar, I wanted to go back to my
family during holidays of my coursework for master’s degree. Fortunately,
Kawasaki Sensei told me that it would be great if you also conducted
preliminary survey for your research during your stay in Myanmar and join them
for meetings. For the first of two weeks of my stay in Myanmar, I had a great
time with my family and I went to libraries and departments to collect data
which will be necessary for my research. After being apart with my family for
five months after I had left them for Tokyo, I spent a great time with them:
going shopping, short trips, having meals together. Also, I conducted
preliminary survey to collect data such as censuses, maps, reports and articles
from libraries and departments. According to our schedule, I had two weeks
before Kawasaki Sensei came to Myanmar; this opportunity had been a great chance
for me and valuable for me. Moreover, I also had to know researchers and
teachers from geography, and history departments of Yangon University for
further collaborations and help. In this sense, my trip to Myanmar has been in
a great help for me and for my research.
Meetings
and Workshop
After Kawasaki and his
group joined me, our group first had dinner together to discuss the travelling
schedule to Nay Pyi Taw, Bago the following days. On 26th February, we
left for Nay Pyi Taw in the early morning by flight to meet DG and DDG from
IWUMD of Myanmar to show appreciation and gave presentation of the results of
the SATREPS project. In this sense, Kawasaki sensei presented the results and
benefits for utilizing the system for Bago River Flood Reduction Plan and gave
speech to appreciate the strong relationship between the concerned
organizations over five years-project. At this time, the results were shown in
modernized manner for which it has been upgraded from the comments received
from previous meeting in 2019. Three presentations were made in total. The
first one is to show the results from the project between SATREPS, JICA, UTOKYO
and YTU collaboration about the analysis of Near Real Time Inundation system in
Bago River Basin. The main reason for our trip to departments is to show
appreciation for the continuous support and collaboration of Myanmar
governments. In addition to this, Kawasaki sensei and counterparts of Myanmar
government discussed for further collaboration between Japan and Myanmar. All
things went very well, and I had a great time to have met officials and seen
great relationships between Japan and Myanmar. For having great relationships
with such a developed country, Japan, it would be much benefitting for my country,
Myanmar, which is only in a transition state for building the country. Also, to
my knowledge, Myanmar is one of the countries on the top list of which will be
severely affected from climate change in the near future, and we still lack
sufficient countermeasures to tackle the coming monstrous disasters, which is
why I thought it is requisite to attain assistance from every angle we can get.
In this sense, I would like to thank Japan and Kawasaki sensei for having
interest to implement disaster risk reduction projects in Myanmar.
Now,
I would like to say a brief explanation for our presentations which had been
recently undertaken under the supervision of Kawasaki sensei in Bago region of
Myanmar. Kawasaki sensei and Dr. Badri from our River and Environmental
Laboratory presented three presentations. The first presentation is the Near
Real Time Inundation analysis system in Bago River system. In this presentation
the main points that I would like to extract are how was Near Real Time System
in Bago River developed – integrating satellite data, in-situ rainfall data,
the system is mainly constructed using DIAS, near real time inundation system
can be utilized to monitor the flooding conditions along the Bago River Basin
from telemetry observations and flood inundation simulation, and we can improve
the disaster mitigation plan from this system as a useful tool for implementing
effective decisions on recovery plans. The second presentation is mainly about
the features of Zaung Tu Dam to bring about the comprehensive disaster
resilient system and the climate data and different instruments were installed
for monitoring the dam conditions, and to evaluate the effectiveness of Zaung
Tu Dam Operation for Flood Control from the two variables such as household and
assets damage and agricultural damage. The Third Presentation is mainly for
Modeling Livelihood Transition induced by Flood Risk Reduction by mentioning to
promote the livelihood conditions in Myanmar by using improved safety and
reduced risk perception and how the results were modeled from the inputs such
as scenario, FRM and responsiveness and the model for hazard and impact was
established and benefits from such approach analysis were depicted.
On
the next day, we went to Bago for Workshop: Flood Risk Reduction Plan for
Socioeconomic Development at Bago and we met the representatives from different
departments for discussing the current problems and insights for reducing the
flood risks in Bago and future collaboration between JICA, SATREPS, UTOKYO and
YTU. In this sense, the representatives from both parties presented their
current problems and how they can overcome these mentioned troubles with the
help from academic field. For the UTOKYO Part, the same presentations were
presented while Myanmar Government counterparts presented about the Zaung Tu
project. In the afternoon, our group went for a courtesy call to Bago Regional
Government for future collaboration between the organizations and presented the
results.
Moreover, I had a
valuable opportunity to go a site visit to informal settlements in Yangon on
the following day. On this day, Kawasaki sensei unfortunately cannot join me as
he had to attend the meeting at YTU. Nonetheless, this field trip had provided
me with valuable hints on my research for the development of City which would
have some effects on the poor people in Yangon. I went to three informal wards
in Hlaing Thar Yar Township for investigating their current conditions and
their current status on living in such informal areas. In this sense, as I do
not have any approval documents for interviewing, I have only conducted only
preliminary survey as when did they move to and why did they move as main
concerns. On the next day, I conducted preliminary survey in the morning and we
went to DWRR and Kawasaki sensei presented the same presentations as in the
earlier days and discussed about the future collaboration between the parties.
In the morning, after our professor has returned to Japan, we still have time
so that we can go around Yangon in order to show some tourist visit site to my
friend, Bhanu Prasad and Dr. Badri. For Bhanu, this is the first time visit to
Myanmar, so I took him to tourist visit sites in Myanmar.
