Flood Hazard and Management in Cambodia: A Review of Activities, Knowledge Gaps, and Research Direction

Abstract

Cambodia is located in one of the most severe flood-vulnerable zones in mainland Southeast Asia. Flooding is the country’s most recurrent and impactful hazard among other natural hazards. This hazard alone, observed in many river basins, has been inflicting huge damages on livelihoods, social infrastructure, and the country’s economy. This study aims to review the current status of flood hazards, impacts, driving factors, management capacity, and future research directions on floods in Cambodia. The findings of this study suggested that there is still a lack of flood-related studies on flood hazard mapping, risk and damage assessment, and future flood analysis in Cambodia. The existing related studies mainly focused on the Tonle Sap Basin and its tributaries, the Lower Mekong Basin, the whole Mekong River Basin, and some of the tributaries of the Mekong River in Cambodia. The fundamental driving factors of the current flooding in Cambodia are impacts of climate change, land-use change, water infrastructure development, and weather extremes. The applications of mathematical and statistical tests and indices, conceptual and physically-based modeling, artificial intelligence and machine learning, and remote sensing are recommended to focus on future research directions on flood in Cambodia in the areas of land-use change, existing and planned operation of water infrastructure, flood hazard and damage assessment, and flood forecasting. The outcomes from these studies and applications would improve the understanding of flood hazard characteristics, reinforce flood management, and achieve flood damage reduction.