Interviews

‘We all face the same challenges, the only differences are in our perspectives’
Interview with Mr. Will Travis, Executive Director of the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission in California, United States of America.

‘Many people in the USA are not aware how big the climate change and sea level rise challenge is’, thus Will Travis. ‘Some of them say they don’t believe in global warming, as if it’s a religion instead of a scientific fact. That is a big challenge for us. Many of our efforts therefore are focused on informing and trying to involve the public in our work.’

One of those efforts was sponsoring the Rising Tides competition, an international design competition the Commission held last year, which generated 130 proposals from 18 nations worldwide to respond to sea level rise. ‘We received many innovative ideas for dealing with this problem, including a design for an inflatable curtain that could close off the Golden Gate during extreme high tides and other ideas for buildings and inundation possibilities at the same time.’

The San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission has turned to the Netherlands for advice and inspiration because of the country’s worldwide fame in engineering solutions and centuries of experience in flood protection. ‘However, the cultural differences are huge’, Travis says. ‘In fact, the primary difference around the world when it comes to dealing with water and sea level rise is how each culture deals with it. Whether you are in San Francisco or Indonesia, India or The Netherlands - we all have the same problems to overcome. The local approach is however different everywhere because the societies differ. You cannot apply the Dutch way of working top down in America for example, since this society is organized through a bottom up system. It would just not work, no matter how brilliant the solution. That is why we try to take lessons from the solution and handle it in a way that fits our culture.’

Despite the differences, the basic challenge is the same everywhere. According to Travis, this is where Delta Alliance has its added value. ‘Because deltas worldwide have far more common features than differences, Delta Alliance gives us the opportunity to learn from each other and share experiences much faster than we could possibly do without the network.’

Next to his activities as Executive Director of the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission in California, Mr. Will Travis is a member of the National Research Council Roundtable on Climate Change Education and serves on the board of trustees of the Bay Area Council Economic Institute, the board of directors of the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association. With 240 square miles of low-lying filled land along the Bay shoreline, he has become a leading advocate for a regional strategy to address climate change and sea level rise in the Bay Area.

More information on the design competition: http://www.risingtidescompetition.com/risingtides/Home.html 
More information on the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission: http://www.bcdc.ca.gov/

"Deltas are the epicenters of today’s and future human life challenges"
Interview with Prof. Jan Sopaheluwakan, LIPI  

Delta and coastal lowlands are fragile parts of the earth. A lot of people live in these areas, which provide many resources and functions for human life. The many different functions and stakes of these areas cause conflicts of interest that are not easy to resolve. Delta Alliance has the potential to bring many parties together and support a joint perspective for addressing issues, claims Prof. Jan Sopaheluwakan, Deputy Chairman for Scientific Services at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) and Delta Alliance Indonesia Coordinator.

Most deltas in the world can be identified as one of two types: urban or rural. Examples of urban deltas include Jakarta, San Francisco, and Rotterdam. Rural deltas include Papua and Mahakam deltas in Indonesia and the Mekong and Red River deltas in Vietnam. Each type has its own set of issues, which are similar throughout the world. Prof. Sopaheluwakan says, ‘the rural deltas struggle with an uncontrolled exploitation of resources. In Indonesia, the Mahakam delta is already entering a point of no return in the illegal deforestation and the conversion of mangroves. We might be too late to restore this, and if actions are not taken promptly, the same thing could happen in other deltas in Indonesia. If we learn from the Mahakam delta, we might be able to save the other deltas and estuaries in the country, which still have millions of acres of fertile lowlands.’

Prof. Sopaheluwakan sees a lot of possibilities for the current partner regions in Delta Alliance to interact. ‘The Netherlands has a lot of expertise on managing water in lowlands and has also a strong funding structure, whereas Indonesia is able to supply its expertise on rural challenges and people to do many of the jobs needed to make the alliance work. Together we should work to manage and reconcile the many different interests of stakeholders.’

Another strong reason to place the delta issues on a higher level is the origin of the problems. ‘Many issues appear to be local, but in fact are driven by global dynamics. This is the case with food security issues and crops for food or fuel, and for many others.’

‘Delta Alliance is now in its starting phase and I truly believe there is a lot of potential for us to work together on the delta issues. I would like to see more active cooperation between the founding members by starting small and working on action oriented projects. We can take the lead and hopefully be inspiring to many coming members.’

Prof. Jan Sopaheluwakan is a Deputy Chairman for Scientific Services at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) and Delta Alliance Indonesia Coordinator. He is also Chairman of the Intergovernmental Coordination Group for the Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning and Mitigation Systems, an initiative of IOC UNESCO. He holds other chair positions for UNESCO and the Joint East Kalimantan Project , a cooperation between KNAW, WOTRO, and LIPI.  Prof. Sopaheluwakan will be representing the Indonesian deltas at coming Delta Alliance events in Shanghai and Rotterdam.