Integrated River Basin Management in the Multi-jurisdictional River Basins: The Case of the Mekong River Basin

Achieving integrated river basin management in large multi-jurisdictional river basins is a difficult task. In the Mekong River basin some of the countries have begun to implement a cooperative framework, which indicates a desire to achieve a form of integrated management. Significant progress has been made but results still fall short of the ideal. The primary reasons for this includes the lack of institutional capacity of the multi-jurisdictional cooperative authority and its counterpart organizations in each of the participating countries, together with a lack of political drive to develop integrated management as a priority.