The Mekong River Commission has delayed the release of a smartphone app that it said would provide flood warnings and AI-generated weather reports for the millions of people living alongside Southeast Asia’s longest river.
The app which was promoted by the commission, or MRC, with fanfare in June was slated to be available to the public in July-August via Google Play and Apple's App Store. Its release date is now uncertain. After its soft launch at a summit in June, a Cambodian official reportedly questioned its usefulness for grassroots communities without internet access and smartphones.
The preview of the “One Mekong” app sparked significant feedback, which resulted in the decision to postpone its release, a commission spokesman told Radio Free Asia.
“Given the number of feedback from communities and member countries that we had received, the scheduled release is delayed to ensure we tackle as much feedback as possible,” Meas Sopheak, said in an email.
He didn’t respond to a question about a new release date.
Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand – the MRC’s four member nations – are among the countries battered by flooding in recent weeks due to deadly Typhoon Yagi and seasonally heavy rains.
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The delay in the project is a setback for the commission’s attempts to demonstrate relevance at a time when foreign donors are reducing their funding, placing a greater onus on its member states to ensure the organization’s financial viability.
It has frequently faced criticism that it is a toothless body since its formation in 1995 when the four neighboring Southeast Asian countries signed the Mekong River Agreement for responsible management of a 4,800-kilometer-long (3,000-mile-long) river that provides livelihoods and food for millions.
The member countries, researchers say, have prioritized their own economic development agendas at the expense of the broader interests of the lower Mekong basin region. Over the objections of neighbors, Laos has pressed ahead with hydropower dams that pose threats to fisheries and the flow of sediments that make the Mekong Delta a fertile rice bowl.
Cambodia, meanwhile, began construction this year of a 180-kilometer (112-mile) canal that will link a tributary of the Mekong to the Gulf of Thailand, raising concerns in Vietnam about reduced water flow into the rice-growing delta.
Santi Baran, an executive at the commission's secretariat who is overseeing the app's development, said it would use AI to generate weather reports and disaster impact simulations, according to video of the June event in Vientiane, Laos where the commission is headquartered.
One of the app’s functions would be to “send push notifications and alerts for flood, drought, weather and disaster warnings to increase user experience,” according to the voiceover of a video presentation that was part of the launch.
The app’s interface was presented in English but push notifications would be in four languages – Thai, Lao, Vietnamese and Khmer.
A chatbot called Nong Nam would answer questions about the weather. People using the app could also view live CCTV from river monitoring stations and upload photos of local conditions to contribute to AI-generated predictions.
The commission has received funding of at least US$370 million since its inception nearly three decades ago, largely from foreign donors, according to its annual reports and donor information.
Denmark, which was historically the largest donor, ended its involvement in 2015 after a review that criticized the commission’s effectiveness.
The commission’s funding in 2022 – the most recent year for which it has published financial information – of nearly $9 million is almost half the average of the previous two decades.
Edited by Mike Firn.