The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development said Saturday that the Cai Lon - Cai Be system would irrigate 384,000 hectares of land, mostly for agriculture and aquaculture, in Kien Giang, Hau Giang, Ca Mau and Bac Lieu provinces in the Mekong Delta.

The system would combine with a coastal dam in the region to combat climate change, rising sea levels and flooding, as well as to develop infrastructure for road transport, it added.

Its investment will be raised through governmental bonds issued by the agriculture ministry. The project, which includes sewers, valves and hydraulic cylinders, is expected to finish by the end of 2021.

Several experts have warned the Vietnam's Mekong Delta could be flooded by 2100.

A paper released last month by Climate Central, a U.S.-based a nonprofit news organization that analyzes and reports on climate science, said the entire southern part of Vietnam, including the Mekong Delta and the nation's economic hub, HCMC, could be underwater by 2050.

In 2016, Vietnam's Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment sketched out scenarios on climate crisis impacts and rising sea levels, which predicted that sea level would increase by one meter by 2100, and would potentially flood 39 percent of the Mekong Delta.

Apart from the series of dams along the Mekong River, experts have also blamed overexploitation of groundwater and sand for many problems facing the delta and its residents.