There are a lot of debates surrounding forest resources in Laos. An interesting trend is how these issues are coming out in the mass media, thus revealing the ambiguities of state policies and practice. The World Bank’s involvement with the Nam Theun 2 dam and SUFORD (Sustainable Upland Forestry and Rural Development Project) intersects with internal jostling over forests, particularly in relation to Vietnamese-funded rubber plantations and the emergence of the National Land Management Authority.
At the beginning of June the World Bank released Laos’ first Environmental Monitor as a complement to the standard Economic Monitor. The executive summary is direct:
Once the Land of a Million Elephants, Lao PDR is now confronted with numerous environmental challenges. The unsustainable exploitation of resources has resulted in degradation of land and loss of natural habitats. This degradation, combined with declining water quality and increasing threats to air quality, is disproportionately impacting the poorest groups in the country.
Three weeks later the Minister of Industry and Commerce announced to the National Assembly the closure of 2,088 out of 2,888 sawmills and furniture factories around the country. Interestingly the Economic Monitor reports that there were only 125-150 sawmills in the country (p. 19) and makes no mention of other wood-processing factories. And a representative from Attapeu noted that “…despite the prime minister’s order, business was booming for timber exports in Attapeu.”
On the same day the Committee for Planning and Investment hosted a meeting “to foster a better understanding of potential environmental impacts brought about by trade liberalisation in Laos.” A representative from the Ministry of Commerce and Industry even stated that it “was necessary to carry out surveys of land to be used for rubber tree plantations to make sure that forests were not cut unnecessarily”.
Yet in the lead up to the upcoming 30th anniversary of the signing of the Lao-Viet treaty a spokeswoman from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that “the most outstanding Vietnamese investment project in Laos had been rubber tree plantations.” New Lao-Viet joint wood processing ventures continue to be announced and some provinces have signalled their intentions to export more wood products.
At the selection of party members for the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry the elected secretary reiterated the ministry’s commitment to reduce slash-and-burn cultivation and “in cooperation with other countries to raise funds … to establish new plantations on vast tracts of land across the country, raising the total forest area to 53 percent, including protected areas.”
There appears to be a lot of action going around forest resources in Laos at the moment and a surprising amount of diversity is getting press coverage.
2 responses so far ↓
1 jonfernquest // Jun 27, 2007 at 1:45 pm
“There are a lot of debates surrounding forest resources in Laos. An interesting trend is how these issues are coming out in the mass media, thus revealing the ambiguities of state policies and practice.”
Maybe they aren’t “ambiguities” but real conflicts of economic interests of different factions within the government or maybe its just a lack of coordination. The Mass Media coverage is only going to be as good as the information they have access to and they could be getting their numbers from people who either: 1. want to intentionally misrepresent the facts, or 2. simply don’t know. I would place my bet on economic interests driving the whole thing. That complex diagram for Cambodia at New Mandala a little while ago certainly showed in bold relief interlocking family economic interests and their positions of power within government.
2 Paul Sidwell // Jul 24, 2007 at 4:58 pm
While the timber trade out of Attapeu is booming, particularly in light of the new sealed road through to Vietnam, it will not last long. Many of the loggers have simply moved from the Boloven Plateau, which they successfully logged out. The Thai owned sawmill near Paksong recently closed down due to lack of logs, and our project was even unable to purchase local sawn timber for regular building construction. The local climate is now changing, and the streams are no longer the havens for spawing fish and insects so important for the local people (and for the wildlife, such as remains). Plantations of rubber, oil palm etc. are going up, on land confiscated from locals in massive land frauds effected by the political elite., worked largley with imported labour.
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