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• The North Vam Nao scheme represents a hybrid governance paradigm. • The scheme is characterised by the participatory and hierarchical approaches for its irrigation and flood management. • Collaborative learning and integration of knowledge among stakeholders take place across vertical and horizontal linkages. • The scheme fosters both 'integrative' and 'adaptive' components in its long-term water governance strategy. Conventional state policies for intensive agricultural production in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD) prescribe the expansion of large-scale water engineering infrastructure. In the upper part of the VMD, compounding environmental challenges presented by climate change, hydropower development upstream, and localised development policies have added greater pressures to rural societies, demanding various governance approaches to deal with change. So far, considerable attention has been devoted to policy narratives of how the bureaucratic approach shapes flood management delta-wide, but little is known about the relevant shift towards adaptive governance at the local level. The analysis presented here is based on qualitative data gathered from fieldworks and desk reviews and argues that the North Vam Nao scheme is an exemplary case for policy transformation in the VMD. A hybrid governance paradigm that is characterised by the participatory and hierarchical approaches allows for the shared learning and interactions of knowledge vertically and horizontally among stakeholders. The study presents nuanced implications of the approach in incorporating both 'integrative' and 'adaptive' components into a long-term water governance strategy, which would serve as a two-pronged contribution to effectively manage environmental uncertainties facing the VMD. It also advocates for the legitimacy of the approach to be institutionalised and widely adopted across the Mekong floodplains and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Rural innovation is the best practice of farmers' adaptation. • Rural innovations include innovative farming and water management practices. • Informal learning networks enable farmers to learn and share knowledge. • Interactions with extension officials enable the translation of farmers' innovations into adaptation policy. Abstract Agriculture is exposed to climatic impacts, especially in developing countries. Adaptation is the predominant practice that farming communities undertake to deal with these climate-induced challenges. While significant attention has been devoted to farmers' adaptation strategies, little is known about how innovative practices are associated with the improvement of rural livelihoods. To address this gap, the paper attempts to investigate how farmers lead the process of rural innovations that constitute successful forms of adaptation to address the mixed impacts of dyke policies and climate change in two distinct agro-ecological zones (i.e. flooding and salinity) in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD). Drawing on qualitative information collected from focus group discussions and interviews across the case studies, the paper argues that farmers are the key innovation actors who contribute to improving rural farming and water management practices. The study suggests that the evolution of farmer-led innovations is mainly attributed to the operation of various informal learning networks that provide important platforms for the generation and diffusion of effective innovative practices across farming communities. It also highlights how farmers contribute their innovative knowledge to local adaptation policies. From the policy perspective, this study sees the development of rural innovation systems as the best practices of farmers' adaptation, which needs to be scaled out to better support agricultural water management in the delta. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Flood management and adaptation are key elements in sustaining farming in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta. • Shadow systems provide space for informal interactions between farmers and extension officials. • Flood management and adaptation boundaries reinforce each other. • Farmers' adaptive knowledge is integrated into local flood management and adaptation policies. Abstract Flood management and adaptation are important elements in sustaining farming production in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD). While over the past decades hydraulic development introduced by the central government has substantially benefited the rural economy, it has simultaneously caused multiple barriers to rural adaptation. We investigate the relational practices (i.e., learning interactions) taking place within and across the flood management and adaptation boundaries from the perspective of social learning. We explore whether and how adaptive knowledge (i.e., experimental and experiential knowledge) derived from farmers' everyday adaptation practices contributes to local flood management and adaptation policies in the selected areas. We collected data through nine focus groups with farmers and thirty-three interviews with government officials, environmental scientists, and farmers. Qualitative analysis suggests that such processes are largely shaped by the institutional context where the boundary is embedded. This study found that while the highly bureaucratic operation of flood management creates constraints for feedback, the more informal arrangements set in place at the local level provide flexible platforms conducive to open communication, collaborative learning, and exchange of knowledge among the different actors. This study highlights the pivotal role of shadow systems that provide space for establishing and maintaining informal interactions and relationships between social actors (e.g., interactions between farmers and extension officials) in stimulating and influencing, from the bottom-up, the emergence of adaptive knowledge about flood management and adaptation in a local context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The social-ecological systems of the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD) are under stress driven by accelerating impacts of climate change, upstream hydropower development, and local flood management policies. These combined complexities have prompted the rural societies to make significant efforts to adapt to changing conditions. While local adaptation represents diverse patterns of communication and interactions across the social sectors, far less attention has been given to how these learning processes occur in the rural communities of practice. This paper attempts to delineate the learning dynamics in which farming households are key practitioners. The mixed methods approach that guides data collection includes focus group discussions, in-depth interviews with key informants and household surveys. The analysis suggests that social learning plays a significant role in facilitating the adoption and dissemination of experiential and experimental knowledge across geographical boundaries. This study highlights important aspects of households' social learning system characterized by informal networks with various forms of bonding and bridging relationships. These learning patterns suggest that informal communication is a dominant learning approach in the rural delta. This study contributes to advancing the theoretical and empirical knowledge of social learning and its policy implications for rural development in the VMD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Land use change in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta is closely linked to rice-oriented agriculture policies. • Land use change forms an underlying driver of out-migration in the delta. • Agricultural mechanisation is one of the key factors that dispossess livelihood opportunities of the poor. • The rural poor migrate to escape "locked-in" impoverishment in rural areas. In developing countries where agricultural production is exposed to adverse impacts of climate change, out-migration is commonly perceived as a safety net for poor farmers who lack adequate access to resources and capacity to adapt to change. In the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD), the land use change driven by the state-led development of water engineering systems (e.g., dykes) and subsequent agricultural mechanisation processes, while it fosters intensive agriculture-oriented development policies, is perceived as the key factor that dispossesses livelihood opportunities of a large segment of rural societies, particularly the poor. This paper aims to examine how land use change is linked to farmers' decisions to migrate. Drawing on the mixed data gathered from focus group discussions, in-depth interviews and household surveys in three flood-prone communities in the VMD, the paper argues that the land use change forms an underlying driver for the surge of out-migration of the rural poor. The study findings indicate that the dyke development for rice-based agricultural modernisation process (e.g., widespread adoption of agricultural mechanisation) creates greater risks of unemployment borne by the poor. As such, they exert out-migration as a viable strategy to adapt to change and to avoid "locked-in" impoverishment in rural areas. This study advocates that policy considerations for delta's rural development should be grounded on the empirical understanding of the land use change and its significance to ensure rural societies' gaining equal access to employment. The study findings provide opportunities for further investigation in comparison with other case studies across the Mekong region and beyond, where state governments still play a dominant decision-making in agricultural development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]