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“The Song Remains the Same”: Examining the Outcomes of Past Hydraulic Engineering and Agro-modernization Schemes in Northeast Thailand

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Water and Power

Part of the book series: Advances in Global Change Research ((AGLO,volume 64))

Abstract

Competition for water and other natural resources in the transboundary Mekong River basin is increasing, leading to a greater propensity for conflict, at both the international and intra-national, local level. Recently, the Thai government has resurrected a decades-old plan to divert considerable volumes of water from the Mekong River into the northeast region, ostensibly for irrigation purposes, thereby re-igniting old concerns by downstream states that mainstream river flows will be reduced and water quality impaired, especially during the critical dry-season period. Such moves reinforce the impression that riparian states are increasingly exerting their sovereign rights to utilise Mekong flows in response to a perceived weakening of the legitimacy of the Mekong River Commission and in the face of a de facto rapidly expanding basin-wide hydraulic construction paradigm, most especially in China and Laos. This chapter investigates some of the historical context and socio-environmental impacts of earlier large-scale irrigation and agribusiness promotion projects, through a case study of the Nam Songkhram basin, a Mekong sub-basin with eco-hydrological attributes similar to those of Cambodia’s Tonle Sap system. It argues that critiques of past developments have not been adequately internalized by political and bureaucratic decision makers charged with water resources policy and planning, raising interesting questions about the social, economic, and ecological prospects for the latest diversionary scheme plan.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Here it should be noted that “conflict” is being used not as a synonym for violence but, rather, to refer to a variety of conflicts and contestations over water that mostly are non-violent, but may occasionally involve force and violence. However, several authors have vigorously argued that the notion of “water wars” between nations is much exaggerated and lacks credible empirical evidence (e.g. Swain 2001; Zeitoun and Warner 2006).

  2. 2.

    For a detailed politico-historical analysis of the subsequent large-scale irrigation development paradigm in the northeast, the reader is directed elsewhere (see Sneddon 2003; Molle and Floch 2008; Molle et al. 2009a, b; Blake 2012).

  3. 3.

    Estimates suggest that irrigation command area coverage in the Northeast up to 2011 was approximately 1.27 million ha or less than 10% of the total arable area (MRC 2011).

  4. 4.

    In early 2017, the Lao government announced its intention to construct a third dam at Pak Beng, between Luang Prabang and the Thai border, to be built by a Chinese state-owned company.

  5. 5.

    An example would be Article 44, a statute introduced under the present military regime that allows the prime minister to issue orders that he deems necessary to “strengthen public unity and harmony” or to prevent any act that undermines public peace. In practice, it has been used as a means to silence government critics through such means as prohibiting political gatherings of over five persons and censorship of the internet, press and mass media.

  6. 6.

    The Lam Nam Oon Irrigation Project (LNOIP) was kick-started with an initial $3.5 million loan from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in September 1967, payable over 25 years.

  7. 7.

    At around the same time that its operations were expanding in the NSB, Asia Tech was negotiating with the Lao government for two plantation concessions in Champasak Province and at several locations in Bolikhamsai and Khammouan Provinces, with a total area of 66,000 ha.

  8. 8.

    Paiboon Nititawan later became a senator who retains close links to the Thai military, according to a February 2015 article in which he defended the actions of the present military junta regime and noted his appointment to a “council on solving Thailand’s problems” (Reuters 2017).

  9. 9.

    As a relatively small bank that became woefully overleveraged after lending many millions of dollars to corrupt politicians using marginal land holdings as collateral, the Bangkok Bank of Commerce became emblematic of a weak political and financial governance regime that came to characterize Thailand around the time of the Asian economic crash. Its senior advisor, Indian-born Rakesh Saxena, fled to Canada to escape the Thai justice system after the bank’s collapse but was later extradited to Thailand in 2009 and jailed for embezzlement in 2012 (BBC News 2012).

  10. 10.

    Pangasianodon gigas specimens weighing up to 270 kg have been caught in the vicinity of Tung Mon in living memory according to locals, but encounters have become extremely rare in recent years, although one or two fishers still targeted them in the 2006 wet season (personal observations).

  11. 11.

    One study commissioned for the Mekong Wetlands Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainable Use Programme estimated that 92% of households accessed wetlands products, and each household derived annual net benefits of 27,000 baht (approximately $818) from the wetlands (Pakdee 2007).

  12. 12.

    For a more detailed historical account of the contested development process, irrigation development drivers, the main actors and groups involved, and the multiple threats to wetlands and other ecosystems in the NSB, please refer to Blake and Pitakthepsombut (2006) and Blake et al. (2009, 2011).

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  1. Independent Scholar, Taunton, Somerset, UK

    David J. H. Blake

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  1. Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA, USA

    Mart A. Stewart

  2. Global Research Institute, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

    Peter A. Coclanis

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Blake, D.J.H. (2019). “The Song Remains the Same”: Examining the Outcomes of Past Hydraulic Engineering and Agro-modernization Schemes in Northeast Thailand. In: Stewart, M., Coclanis, P. (eds) Water and Power. Advances in Global Change Research, vol 64. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90400-9_18

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