Op-ed: Lessons of water management from lowland nations Vietnam can draw on

Editor’s note: This piece is authored by Darren Chua, a Singaporean who has lived in Vietnam for over 12 years. It has been edited by Tuoi Tre News for clarity and comprehensiveness.

Vietnam’s floods in 2025 have been severe. Torrential rains submerged homes, damaged crops, and disrupted transport links across the provinces. The toll has been staggering: 409 people dead or missing, with economic losses already at US$3.2 billion and climbing.

Having lived in Vietnam since 2013, I’ve seen how the floods return year after year. Communities adapt as best they can, but the scale of damage keeps growing. It’s clear that Vietnam needs to move beyond short-term fixes and look at how other lowland nations have managed water as both a risk and a resource.

Singapore and the Netherlands offer two distinct but complementary lessons.

Singapore’s Marina Barrage: Engineering foresight

Singapore is no stranger to heavy tropical rains. Yet it has avoided catastrophic flooding through deliberate planning. The Marina Barrage, completed in 2008, is a prime example.

Built across the Marina Channel, the barrage created Singapore’s 15th reservoir in the city center and serves three key purposes: it supplies water by expanding the catchment area to two-thirds of the island, controls floods through nine crest gates and pumps that regulate water levels and protect low-lying areas such as Chinatown and Geylang, and provides a lifestyle benefit as the reservoir also doubles as a recreational space.

At the groundbreaking in 2005, Lee Kuan Yew explained its impact: “The barrage will alleviate floods… The flood-prone areas in Singapore will be cut from more than 3,000 hectares in the 1970s to 100 hectares by the end of 2007.”

This project shows how infrastructure can be multi-purpose: securing water, preventing floods, and enhancing urban life. 

For Vietnam’s fast-growing coastal cities, similar integrated projects could reduce flood risk while supporting urban development.

The Netherlands: Living with water

The Netherlands lies largely below sea level. Its survival depends on centuries of water management. The 2021 Limburg floods, which caused hundreds of millions in damages, reinforced the need for layered strategies.

According to 4TU’s resilience study – conducted by the 4TU Federation, the alliance of the four universities of technology in the Netherlands that aims to boost and pool technical expertise – the Dutch approach includes awareness, where citizens are educated about water safety; prevention through dikes and barriers that protect critical zones; spatial planning through the Room for the River program that allows certain areas to flood to reduce pressure elsewhere; crisis management involving rapid response during emergencies; and recovery focused on rebuilding stronger after disasters.

The philosophy is simple: do not just fight water, learn to live with it. For Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, this is highly relevant. Instead of endlessly raising dikes, controlled flood zones could absorb excess water and protect key economic areas.

What Vietnam can take forward

Vietnam has invested in dikes, reservoirs, and disaster response systems, but the floods of 2025 show that more is needed. Lessons from Singapore and the Netherlands point to practical steps, including integrated infrastructure with reservoirs and detention tanks that serve multiple purposes; green solutions such as rooftop gardens, permeable pavements, and wetlands to absorb rainfall; controlled flooding with floodplains designated as buffers following the Dutch model; community preparedness through stronger flood alerts, evacuation drills, and education campaigns; and smarter recovery by rebuilding with designs that anticipate future floods.

Floods disrupt daily life—families stranded, crops destroyed, roads cut off. The response often focuses on rescue and repair. That saves lives, but it does not reduce the long-term risk.

Singapore’s Marina Barrage shows how foresight can change the equation. The Netherlands proves that adaptation is possible even in the most flood-prone regions. Vietnam does not need to copy these models exactly, but it can adopt the principles: plan ahead, design for water, and prepare communities.

Vietnam’s floods are not just natural disasters; they are signals that the country must rethink its approach. By learning from Singapore’s foresight and the Netherlands’ adaptability, Vietnam can move from damage control to long-term design.

The floods of 2025 are a turning point. They not only show the challenges but also the opportunity to build smarter systems. Vietnam has the talent and ambition to do this. The question is whether it will choose to act boldly, as Singapore and the Netherlands once did.