The Lancang-Mekong River (“LMR” for short) is the most important transnational river in Asia, and has a total trunk stream length of 4,880 km. It flows through China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, and into the South China Sea in Ho Chi Minh City of Vietnam. It is the sixth largest river in the world. It has a large river basin area, many estuaries, and abundant water resources.

Since the 1990s, while the LMR Basin has witnessed great progress in social and economic development, water resources security is still at risk. On the one hand, major inundation events such as tropical hurricanes, floods, and mudslides have been frequent. In 2015, the LMR Basin was the region most affected by natural disasters in the world; on the other hand, economic development has caused water environment problems in the Basin to further increase. The LMR Basin is one of the regions with the biggest development potential in Asia and even the world. However, economic growth has not been decoupled from resource consumption or environmental pollution. Due to industrialization and urbanization, the region is facing the contradiction between development and protection. The overall quality of the ecological environment in the region is deteriorating.