The annual Lake Tahoe Summit was held on Aug. 14, allowing scientists, policymakers and local stakeholders to gather and discuss the management of the Lake Tahoe watershed. The summit was also attended by a group of international leaders as well as the Assistant Administrator of the Asia bureau of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), Michael Schiffer.
The visitors, part of the International Visitor Leadership Program, the U.S. Department of State’s professional exchange program, attended the summit in large part due to the connections fostered between the University of ÁùºÏ±¦µä, Reno and foreign resource management officials through the USAID-funded Wonders of the Mekong program. The Wonders of the Mekong seeks to study and preserve the natural and cultural resources of the lower Mekong basin, which is the world’s largest fishery. Faculty from the University including Zeb Hogan, the director of the Wonders of the Mekong program, and Sudeep Chandra, the director of the Global Water Center on the University campus, have spent significant time in Cambodia, where the Wonders of the Mekong program is supported by USAID.
The summit was also attended by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, Senators Jacky Rosen (NV), Catherine Cortez Masto (NV), and Laphonza Butler (CA), House Representatives Mark Amodei (NV), Kevin Kiley (CA) and John Garamendi (CA), and University President Brian Sandoval.
One of the major draws for Schiffer to the Lake Tahoe Summit was its inherent transboundary collaboration. While Lake Tahoe spans part of the boundary between two states in the U.S., the Mekong River spans boundaries between several countries.
“We are all learning how to manage transboundary resources more sustainably, and our work in the Mekong sub-region presents new opportunities for us to learn from one another and collaborate,” Schiffer said. “Through this partnership, we can apply cutting edge innovations and solutions, like those developed right here in ÁùºÏ±¦µä, abroad.”
The current and emerging foreign leaders from the Mekong region were invited to attend the Lake Tahoe Summit by the University of ÁùºÏ±¦µä, Reno. Alongside attending the summit, the visitors had the opportunity to meet with local Indigenous communities, including the Washoe and Paiute tribes, whose perspectives have been taken into greater account in recent years. Hogan said the visitors appreciated hearing the Indigenous leaders’ viewpoints on water conservation for the region.
“Our international participants expressed that they were impressed that political leaders, nonprofit organizations, scientists and community representatives all met together to discuss the status of the lake and its future,” Hogan said.
The entire delegation will return to their respective communities in Southeast Asia with new ideas about how to manage a shared watershed.
“The learning happens across cultures and places,” Chandra said. “We can learn from their experiences of getting local communities to care about the health of the watershed, as they can learn from our experiences accommodating explosive visitation in Lake Tahoe.”
“As we’ve seen at the Lake Tahoe Summit, community leaders in the American West are identifying unique ways to overcome drought, pollution, erosion, overfishing and other complex challenges through cooperation over transboundary water management,” Schiffer said. “USAID has successfully partnered with the University of ÁùºÏ±¦µä, Reno and its Global Water Center to apply the same best practices to conserve the Mekong River, which provides drinking water and livelihoods to more than 70 million people in Southeast Asia.”
The Wonders of the Mekong program started in 2017 with the goal of conserving the critical resources in the Mekong River. The project supports dozens of students and scientists in the U.S. and the Mekong region, building capacity and facilitating collaborations within the Mekong region and beyond. Recent achievements by the Wonders of the Mekong program include development of networks across diverse stakeholders to improve the effectiveness of conservation efforts, strengthened legal protections and conservation plans for rare and threatened species, and implementation of research to better understand and sustainably manage natural resources to support livelihoods, food security, and climate resilience.
“Countries along the Mekong River are in a challenging neighborhood,” Schiffer said. “Dams installed upstream by the People’s Republic of China disrupt ecosystems, water supplies, food security and livelihoods of indigenous communities downstream in Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Laos. This is disruptive in a region that is home to important U.S. trading partners, healthy global ecosystems, and often serves as the first line of defense against disease outbreaks.”
“Strengthening collaborations between international water conservationists, scientists, policymakers and stakeholders will benefit all parties involved,” Chandra said. “Protecting Lake Tahoe and the Mekong River are the same mission. We all want to preserve natural resources for future generations.”
