David – thanks : I agree with all your points, and it is especially interesting what you say about Lanna.
Though you may under-estimate the Shinawatra loyalty there.
Anyhow – as I said : this is the worst scenario. Probably also the most unlikely.
Never under-estimate Thai ability to find a compromise – in even the most difficult circumstances : they are geniuses at this.
Far more so than farang – is my impression.
And this is especially hopeful now that His Majesty is healthily back on the scene :
if they follow the King’s advice, Thais will eventually find a way out of these long, very difficult times (5 years now !).
I do not expect nor want Australia or any other country to interferein Malaysia’s domestic politics. Neither did Anwar.
That also means that I do not want Rudd to support or legitimate a corrupt and racist regime. Calling Malaysia a robust democracy is tantamount to supporting a corrupt regime and Rudd is wrong here.
ASEAN is critiqued for supporting Burma and rightly so. This is not interference.
Malaysia is not a democracy and Rudd should not legitimate a racist or corrupt regime.
Comments #1 and #2 argued that ethics must be interpreted in terms of politics. This leads to the antithesis of reality and utopia.
“Men’s morals are paralysed when it comes to international conduct,” versus “Those who deny the possibility of an international morality naturally contest the existence of an international community.”
However those principles are not the policy. If we are to have a policy we must take the particular situations of Malaysia and consider what action or inaction is suitable for the current situation of Malaysia. In my humble point of view, Malaysia has a strong economic base, it certainly can afford a more open political arena which will eventually benefit Malaysia.
Another worry is HMK’s eldest child. As far as I know, she has relinquished her Chao Fah status when she married. Then why is it today she still occupies a prominent place at a state function? And as a commoner now, she should not be entitled to the royal vocabulary accorded high-ranking members of the royal family. Or is there an exception made somewhere unknown to me? Can someone help?
thanks for your reply. that is indeed the very worst case scenario that you have painted there! i would, however, beg to differ on a few points:
lanna
indeed, lanna’s complete incorporation into the body politic of “thailand” is barely a century old, and remains somewhat tentative… however, having lived and worked in changwat chiang mai – including during the time of the failed songkran uprising earlier this year – i cannot say that i have the impression that the revolutionary or seccessionist sentiment there is on par with that in isaan… for instance, during the songkran uprising, the chiang mai red shirts were unable to muster more than a few hundred people to circle the moat on motorbikes, honking their horns before they set out to block the highway to lamphan… the overwhelming majority of chiang mai residents continued their festivities rather undisturbed… thus, while i cannot speak on the loyalty of the rank-and-file 4th army, any secessionist movement needs the support of the broad mass of the populace… this may be given in isaan, but concerning lanna, i am not so sure…
lao pdr
i don’t think the lao government would be foolish enough to committ any troops for a suicide commando into isaan, ruining political and trade relations with one of their most powerful and important neighbours for generations to come…
isaan
while i wholeheartedly agree that many isaan people have had it with the (central) thais… just think for a minute what seceeding – in the highly unlikely case that such a move would be successful – from thailand would mean… for example, think of the billions of baht in remittances that flow from thailand proper into isaan every year, what would happen to these if the borders were shut? there are millions of poor burmese to the west just waiting to replace isaan people in the bars, hotels, brothels and train-station toilets in bangkok and elsewhere…
on top of that, i think there are enough powerful thais brainwashed with chauvinistic nationalism, prepared to destroy and keep isaan rather than let it go… indeed, there may well be a “milosevic-in-waiting” somewhere in bangkok already… perhaps of blue blood even…
in sum, i don’t think a seccessionist war is looming (much as it would please hun sen to see it happen!)… rather, i think there will be an evolutionary process of building greater autonomy for the various regions in thailand, beginning with the end of the current reign, and furthered by the regionalism that will grow with increased asean integration and democratization… i do not believe that the 21st century will be a century of the dominant nation state in the way that the 20th was…
we are at the beginning of a generational process, as far as i am concerned… you may disagree, but i believe you would agree that this would be the more desirable scenario 😉
I do not have much faith in “silent majority”, I put more value on the fact than neither reds nor yellows have been able to mobilize substantial crowds with compelling agenda.
Let’s see if reds cancel their upcoming Dec 10 rally, and how many people will show up if they don’t.
I think the days of street politics deciding country’s fate are over.
On Thaksin’s pardon – what do you think the actual number was? At some point there was talk of reaching ten million.
”
[Hydropower projects in Laos] suffer from all the expected deficiencies, which arise from trying to use an EIA process to substitute for civil society mechanisms in an weak military-kleptocrat oligarchy lacking (and actively preventing the development of) almost all the institutions and procedures of a civil society.
The World Bank and ADB do not have the quality of personnel in the field, and do not provide the necessary level of backing from the top, to prevent the mitigation programmes from becoming merely large-scale employment-benefit agencies for poorly qualified well-connected people with no connections to the affected stakeholders.
As a result the actual mitigation measures would make any professional in the field of tropical agriculture, rural livelihood intensification, smallholder irrigation, land tenure, public health and water supply think they had moved back about a century.
Utterly pathetic by international standards in these fields.
So there is a substantial risk that a well-organised NGO might just do
some serious work to reveal the deficiencies of the mitigation works
so far carried out.
However the more serious risks come from impact events which have not yet occurred.
These are:
a) The impacts of the diverted water on the Xe Bangfai drainage
channel, particularly erosion downstream of the diversion canal, and aggravation of flooding as a result of the new sediment transport situation, which will silt up this channel for many decades and possibly even centuries as the new the hydraulic equilibria are reached.
WB, ADB and the Developer have steadfastly refused to address this risk, which properly requires an engineering fix at high costs, presumably because it is so expensive to mitigate that it would remove all the economic benefits of having a diversion (high head for minimum structure cost). By transferring the costs to environmental and social mitigation works, the planners have saved $500,000,000 and committed to spend only tens of millions. This is a massive risk as the NGO’s will eventually become educated enough to compare NT2 diversions with others. When the flooding starts to kick in (it will become evident in about 2013) they could find ways to present the project as being essentially flawed at the conceptual-design level, and compel the owners to become involved in continuous costly emergency works and measures. WB and ADB have fashioned an environment in which NT2 has committed to improve living standards of all affected people. In short the risk exposure is absurdly high.
b) Other Ministries, notably Ministry of Agriculture and the new Land Management Authority are now trying to get in on the benefits of the mitigation budget. MoA is trying to force NT2 to build flood protection bunds. As the Xe Bangfai valley and flood plain is more or less still at its natural state (just a few dodgy flood/irrigation structures), and as developers are about to introduce mechanized farming (rubber, eaglewood, jatropha (biofuel!!!), cassava, sugar cane, Eucaplyptus and Acacia mangium, etc.) extensively and without land use practice control or regulation, to the catchment hills, NT2 could find itself compelled to become involved in flood control works.
These would be greater than the costs of the entire NT2 Project, so only minor, unsatisfactory works will be carried out. Once again NT2 is vulnerable to collect all the opprobrium and to incur significant costs which arise from multiple mostly uncontrollable sources.
c) The rapidly expanding presence of Chinese and Vietnamese operators are already increasing the pressure on the Nakai catchment forests and biodiversity making protection of these resources almost impossible. This will become evident soon from any objective monitoring, and once again NT2 is placed to take all the blame for something over which it has virtually no control, a) for opening up the area b) for not ensuring its measures for protecting the resources are effective.
d) The reservoir water quality will be severely impaired for many years. Biomass clearance is being confused with logging and the NT2 cannot find a way to break free from the military-commercial interests which lock them into restricted procurement of contractors, which would be necessary to solve the problem. Inundation will as a result produce bad smells, dead fish and frenzied NGO reactions publicising the events.
Livelihoods will be damaged in the Xe Bangfai and possibly the Nam Theun. It will take 5 years before a sustainable reservoir fishery could start to be developed, but there will be windfall fishing of colonising species.
NT2 has written a story about how the reservoir will develop which
will seem to be very off-track. Quite normally these events will
trigger a loss of confidence in the project. The Public will perceive
it to be an example of yet another corporate deceit, furnishing high
life styles in the Boardroom and more impoverishment in the fields of
the already impoverished.
Question: Would inter-basin transfers of the magnitude of THPC/NT2 would be permitted in most first world jurisdictions?
“This topic is being debated by some research workers. I thought you would be interested to see where the debate is at this stage.
The disallowment is of “inter-basin transfers or large magnitude without engineering works to prevent erosion and river sedimentation”.
Switching large flows from a big river into a small stream without engineering of the recipient channel as far as it takes to prevent erosion and sedimentation is what I have failed to find an example of.
Interbasin transfer of large volumes of water is of course very widespread in developed countries, and involves massive civil
works in tunnels, pipes and channels.
The main legislative thrust in developing countries is about the equitability of the diversion. Do the people who “lose” the water get recompensed? It is assumed that the people who receive the water need it and have got their infrastructure prepared to take it. This is always the case as water transfer is made as part of a very political (and in transboundary situations international relations are involved) process and the justification of the investments is based on every m3 being needed (as the cost of the diversion is based on the design flows).
No community pays to divert water which is not going to be used in high value applications. This demand-use angle ensures the pipes, canals, storage structures, etc, are in place,
Only in regions without civil society process, where water has almost no value, and may be seen as having almost as high a negative as positive value (e.g. developing countries in monsoon regions), one can find NT2 and THPC type aberrations.
One would expect social and political changes in the next 20 years will lead to a realisation that these two schemes only made sense for a
few stakeholders (mostly non-resident) for a short period of time.
Pressure on the IPP’s to make the necessary engineering works to make economic use of the diverted water, and to prevent its adverse effects, will inexorably grow, (it’s already started) making the IPP progressively less economic, until it comes to be operated as an irrigation or fishery control structure, with incidental power generation.
This has happened already with several Thai hydropower projects (e.g. Chulabon). This makes a nonsense of the normal way arriving at net present values of hydropwer projects in developing countries. World Bank and ADB are either unable or unwilling to grapple with the realities of water use and value progressions in developing countries.
They use 30 and 50 year cash flows, supposing water remains a free resource, and that erosion and floods will be tolerated indefinitely, which is pure fantasy.
The opportunity to take advantage of the high returns on water, which its low costs and lack of user-regulation in poor countries permit, has proved irresistible to speculators, and, sadly, to the development banks.
It is a curious paradox that as these countries develop, the development banks will find these projects become uneconomic.
Hydropower in developing countries, for many reasons and not just this one described above, has to be planned very differently from the current IPP model.
It could be argued that the IPP approach has impaired proper use of water for mixed energy-agriculture-consumption in poor countries over many decades into the future. Not very satisfactory for a development bank to hear, particularly as the pressures of climate change adaptation grow.
“Just a quick outline, and just for you as scientist to scientist.
Usually transbasin diversion just nip off the top of a catchment (e,g Nam Leuk, Nam Mang 3) and use the very high head to ensure low flows are economic. If its done intelligently it can have relatively low impacts and the energy per cumec is high.
Where it has not usually been contemplated, or as far as we can see, implemented, is about the middle of a catchment where flows are large.
At this stage flows are so large that the gains you can get from a “stolen” head tend to be lost in the costs of building the channels needed to manage the discharge from the power station.
THHP and NT2 have avoided all (or in NT2 case) some of these costs by doing it in Laos where they have no deep knowledge of hydropower normal practice.
What makes diversion discharges even more difficult to manage in Laos are:
1. The Monsoon climate (so you tend to get flooding in the recipient river when you are making your highest discharges)
2. Egat’s preference for high capacity export plants which enables them to turn the producer into a peak power supplier in the dry season whether he’s paid for this or not, which in turn means
* very high flows into flooded recipient rivers
* intermittent flows in the dry season with consequent aggravation of erosion and higher turbidity
3. A rural population which lives on (recipient) river flood plains and depends on wet season rice, fisheries, river bank gardens and livestock.
A middle catchment diversion in Laos needs a lot of engineering downsteam of the power station.
It seems that the developers are taking advantage of the situation.
NT2 will be the largest ever (and last?) hydropower basin diversion… No one has ever discharged 100 cumecs into a 5 cumec stream. Data on these types of project are scarce because they are not allowed in most places. … they did some big diversions in Russia and China 40 to 50 years ago, but nothing seems to have entered the internet record yet.
…
There are 1 to 2 degrees centigrade of daily change in the dry season which coincides with opening and closing of the turbine and goes down the river attenuating to very low values at the Mekong. This could get up to 4 degrees when the THXP is operating. What sort of problems would this daily change cause?
…
The erosion of the Nam Hai has increased by between 30 and 60 fold resulting in removal of 8.5-14 million tons of sediment from the Nam Hai banks since 1998. This material has gone into the Hinboun, and a large proportion has settled in the river. As a result there is a sediment wave in the Hinboun which is being continually
enlarged. Equilibrium would be expected to be some time in the future, and it is not a satisfactory equilibrium. As a result of the sediment wave the flooding has been aggravated, and it is now judged by the affected people on the river bank and in the
backwater areas as more risky to grow wet season rice, and more risky to raise livestock. About 5000 families are affected in the Hinboun valley. We have surveyed the losses experienced and in economic terms the average household loss in $150 to $300 per year. Over 8 years the loss amounts to about $11 million to $13
million.
Losses will continue to get worse for some time even if the diversion discharge is canalised to the Hinboun and the THHP discharge is closed in the flooding periods, as we have an accumulating progression going on.
The rice damage is exacerbated by the turbidity in the water resulting from the erosion in the Nam Hai, which provides a significant colloidal component in the suspended sediment. Slower flood drainage, higher water levesl and higher turbidity all combine to produce the risk aggravation reported by farmers and
observed in their abandonment of wet season rice fields. Livestock production suffers from more disease risks during prolonged flooding, and damage to pastures from heavier sediment on grasses and other fodder.
The THPC Mitigation and Compensation Programme does not make much of significant contribution in reversing this impoverishment, as it is too small a programme and poorly distributed, favouring the better off and less affected households, and not yet reaching all affected villages. …
I characterise this as initial ecological “shock” as the new flow and sediment transport/turbidity regime was established, and a slow and slight recovery as new fish populations adapting to the new conditions and dynamics became established and fishermen learnt how to exploit the new situation, leaving the overall
capacity of the river to sustain livelihoods and incomes significantly impaired at the moment. It remains to be seen how much further the changes in the river system, with more frequent and prolonged flooding, and new migration patterns still being
built up by pioneering populations, can bring the system back towards or even past previous productivity levels. I doubt this can be forecast, and there are substantial risks that new impact events (THXP’s enlarged diversion, Pathen mining already
expanding, concession cash cropping effects on the catchment) will deliver further shocks.
Nam Theun 2’s discharge will have very similar effects on the Xe Bangfai rice farming, livestock production and fishing systems.
…
At the present time there is no doubt that the persons consulted and engaged by both THPC and NT2 come from too narrow a range of skills and lack the breadth of experience of fluvial changes and their consequences for river bank dwellers. This is a weakness of both projects, and it reflects the way the Projects have “selected” the skills they needed (or need) to build hydropower projects, without getting bogged down in the downstream problems.
It has been assumed by all parties, including the World Bank, that engineers with hydraulic knowledge can describe the behaviour of rivers, and that social scientists can evaluate the performance of rice plants under inundation and the reactions of aquatic ecosystems to flow and sediment transport changes. This is about the same as expecting a botanist to perform surgery on a cow (they are both biologists), or having a fluvial scientist design a power intake and tunnel.
Certainly they would do a better job than an economist, financial analyst or a lawyer, but it would still not come close to being safe or reasonable.
So we all know this is absurd. Why then do we think engineers know everything about rivers and social scientists know everything about ecology? An even more important question is this. What sort of hydraulic engineer is prepared to make fluvial science judgments, and what sort of social scientist is prepared to
evaluate the effect of flooding on rice crops?
Neither NT2 and THHP have taken their engineering far enough downstream. This is particularly true of THHP. If there is not a proper fluvial science study of the recipient channel downstream of the discharge point of a large diversion which shows the additional flows do not increase erosion and sediment transport
rates, and do not aggravate flooding, then the project is improperly designed. I don’t think this principle can be challenged as it’s already embodied in most of the regulations and laws in almost all the countries which have regulations and laws.
The effect of this design flaw (or defect or malpractice) is in effect to transfer a large amount of the risks and costs of the project to the affected people, relying on a regulation system and mitigation process which is virtually non-functional to remedy the losses.
It is unsound to leave avoidable damage of this magnitude
to be sorted out by mitigation and compensation anywhere in the world, and in countries lacking services and capacity for providing relief, it could be described as reckless.
It appears to me that the international NGO community will end up having to provide rice for the Hinboun farmers, and eventually this may also apply to the Xe Bangfai. This could become a Pak Mun type problem in the future if the Xe Bangfai and Nam Hinboun get blocked with sediment. Both rivers are working their way through limestone reefs and have numerous constriction points. They are not ideal for taking large increased flows, and very far from ideal for movement of sediment.
The proper remedy of this sort of impact event lies in extending the engineering downstream. I know this is more expensive in the short term, but the overall economic losses from a river damaged by a sediment wave in Laos will run to tens of millions of dollars, probably hundreds of millions.
It will be a source of strong and in my opinion legitimate criticism by public interest groups if the appropriate expertise is not applied to analyzing the fluvial systems and production systems of the recipient rivers, and, if necessary implementing engineering and operations modifications to prevent avoidable damage. Only unavoidable damage or unforeseen damage should be left to the mitigation and compensation programmes.”
Nick – like you, until recently when I left Thailand, perhaps for good, I was living in a mixed working class / middle class area.
Two things struck me :
1) the way poorer members of the area were almost fearless in their open support of the Red-shirts – eg. loudly listening to Red-Shirt radio, cheering when they anyone wearing a red-shirt (whether political or not), and those from Isaarn increasingly willing to voice their increasingly brazen, almost break-away Isaarn identity – some to the point of calling Isaarn their “country”.
2) was the still quite evident menace of intimidation from semi-criminal thuggish Yellow-Shirt supporters.
It seems to me much of the Yellow Shirt – and more moderate Royalist reation is coming from a sense of fear and threat : they know they’ve lost Isaarn (ages ago), and Lanna (Chiang Mai, etc.),
that the military is deeply divided, that the police – overwhelmingly Thaksin-supporters – are refusing to be moved
out of their posts in favour anti-Thaksin officers.
I.e. that the “Thai” state is now severely fractured – and that the old levers of reaction seem to only half-work (at brest from their point of view). It seems the reactionaries are terrified of an uprising in Bangkok. They realise they’ve lost Isaarn and Lanna, now almost separate states, if not yet separate nations.
David – very well said re. democratic pluralism – or lack thereof in both Lao and Thailand.
“Isaarn alone” ?
No – I don’t think so : currently Isaarn – almost ready to break-away from “Thai” dictatorship-disguised-as-democracy, is supported by Lanna (“Thailand’s” North, – eg. Chiang Mai, Chieng Rai, etc.).
The Fourth Army in Lanna, and the Third Army in Isaarn, draw the vast majority of their soldiers fom these areas. And will fight to defend their local people, if Bangkok tries moving troops into these areas for a crackdown : indeed Bangkok has already tried this pressure, without much success.
The Lao government – very reluctantly indeed – would find it difficult to not send its’ small – but far more battle-hardened – military into Isaarn, in aid of any uprising by the Third Army, especially if refugees started pouring across into Laos. This is the worst-case scenario. And then there is Cambodia !
A Lao speaker from Yasothon confirms the ‘ai-nong’ (same household) vs ‘phi-nong’ (more distant acquaintance) distinction reported here. And a number of urban Thais simply don’t believe it.
I’m a Rudd fan – and support the PM’s position here.
Lopez is asking Australia to step beyond the bounds of reasonable outside commentary, etc., and into interfering in the internal affairs of an independent state.
Australians already have a far too widespread reputation as over-bearing white-out-post colonialists, all to0 willing to lecture Asians about how to run their countries.
Thank God Rudd has stepped away from t hat stereo-type, this time.
Susie
You made a very pertinent assessment baout the past 2 decades of “pressure” to change the behavior of the present government. There is neither the C & E or any principles other than the Bash-A-Junta popularity with the democratic west.
Initially was to boycott the SLOR shameful robbing of the result. Then it was save Daw AUng San Suu Kyi with a potpourri of advocacy for “democracy, Human right” mixed in.
Fact:
1) There has not been any historical precedence in applying such “pressure” to a country that has NO threat to any other neighbor, the west or let alone the world.
2) Results of sanction usually are creating a nation even worst than b/f the sanctions are applied.
The West acted without any concrete objectives other Bash-A-Junta or save DASSK therefore resulting in this present:
1)Defiant and intransigence Than Shwe as similar to Castro in Cuba or Kim J I in DPRK.
2) A weaker more submissive citizenry who has no hope put to acquiesce to the dictators just to survive and to avoid being hurt.
Yet the irrelevant debate continue.
Taiwan, The Philippines, even S Korea as example all the while scream out to the fact that only massive economic aids, which these countries received, under the guise of anti communism for over 4 decades continually until the respective citizenry found enough strength in their middle class to boot the respective dictators out of offices permanently. These dictators are known and proven to be comparable in the degree of atrocities, corruptions and all other travesties that will make Than Shwe look like a Monk.
Definitely not Chicken or eggs but Laissez fair with massive amount of aid due to the catch up game the west need to be playing to save a citizenry who has nearly given up in every respect. Not unlike the one in DPRK.
on the topic of thai-isaan-lao, i had an interesting discussion with a lao friend in vientiane about 2 weeks ago… she said that many of her friends and relatives “on the other side of the river” would gladly “leave thailand” and “join lao”, IF lao had “two governments to choose from, like in thailand”, i.e. democracy…
now of course we can debate the extent to which democracy exists in thailand… after all, the choice of the thai people has been grossly disrespected in the last few years… but i find it highly interesting to note that at least some people in isaan seem to be linking the issue of their ethnic identity and “belonging” to the issue of democracy and political rights…
perhaps even more interestingly, when i suggested to my friend that multi-party democracy might not be coming to the lao pdr anytime soon, she replied “well, then isaan will be alone, only isaan…”
By the way PlanB, are you someone from the Burma Economic Watch of the Macquarie Uni’s Economics Faculty? Just curious. BEW has an interesting article in their May 2008 Blog written by Dr. Hlaing Myint about some particular events in Delta.
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Thailand 1 – Vietnam (and Laos) 1
David – thanks : I agree with all your points, and it is especially interesting what you say about Lanna.
Though you may under-estimate the Shinawatra loyalty there.
Anyhow – as I said : this is the worst scenario. Probably also the most unlikely.
Never under-estimate Thai ability to find a compromise – in even the most difficult circumstances : they are geniuses at this.
Far more so than farang – is my impression.
And this is especially hopeful now that His Majesty is healthily back on the scene :
if they follow the King’s advice, Thais will eventually find a way out of these long, very difficult times (5 years now !).
Anwar and Rudd
Hi Chris and anonymous reader,
I do not expect nor want Australia or any other country to interferein Malaysia’s domestic politics. Neither did Anwar.
That also means that I do not want Rudd to support or legitimate a corrupt and racist regime. Calling Malaysia a robust democracy is tantamount to supporting a corrupt regime and Rudd is wrong here.
ASEAN is critiqued for supporting Burma and rightly so. This is not interference.
Malaysia is not a democracy and Rudd should not legitimate a racist or corrupt regime.
Anwar and Rudd
Sadly, Anwar is correct. I expected a little more from Rudd.
Anwar and Rudd
Comments #1 and #2 argued that ethics must be interpreted in terms of politics. This leads to the antithesis of reality and utopia.
“Men’s morals are paralysed when it comes to international conduct,” versus “Those who deny the possibility of an international morality naturally contest the existence of an international community.”
However those principles are not the policy. If we are to have a policy we must take the particular situations of Malaysia and consider what action or inaction is suitable for the current situation of Malaysia. In my humble point of view, Malaysia has a strong economic base, it certainly can afford a more open political arena which will eventually benefit Malaysia.
Thaksin on Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn
Another worry is HMK’s eldest child. As far as I know, she has relinquished her Chao Fah status when she married. Then why is it today she still occupies a prominent place at a state function? And as a commoner now, she should not be entitled to the royal vocabulary accorded high-ranking members of the royal family. Or is there an exception made somewhere unknown to me? Can someone help?
Thailand 1 – Vietnam (and Laos) 1
dear chris,
thanks for your reply. that is indeed the very worst case scenario that you have painted there! i would, however, beg to differ on a few points:
lanna
indeed, lanna’s complete incorporation into the body politic of “thailand” is barely a century old, and remains somewhat tentative… however, having lived and worked in changwat chiang mai – including during the time of the failed songkran uprising earlier this year – i cannot say that i have the impression that the revolutionary or seccessionist sentiment there is on par with that in isaan… for instance, during the songkran uprising, the chiang mai red shirts were unable to muster more than a few hundred people to circle the moat on motorbikes, honking their horns before they set out to block the highway to lamphan… the overwhelming majority of chiang mai residents continued their festivities rather undisturbed… thus, while i cannot speak on the loyalty of the rank-and-file 4th army, any secessionist movement needs the support of the broad mass of the populace… this may be given in isaan, but concerning lanna, i am not so sure…
lao pdr
i don’t think the lao government would be foolish enough to committ any troops for a suicide commando into isaan, ruining political and trade relations with one of their most powerful and important neighbours for generations to come…
isaan
while i wholeheartedly agree that many isaan people have had it with the (central) thais… just think for a minute what seceeding – in the highly unlikely case that such a move would be successful – from thailand would mean… for example, think of the billions of baht in remittances that flow from thailand proper into isaan every year, what would happen to these if the borders were shut? there are millions of poor burmese to the west just waiting to replace isaan people in the bars, hotels, brothels and train-station toilets in bangkok and elsewhere…
on top of that, i think there are enough powerful thais brainwashed with chauvinistic nationalism, prepared to destroy and keep isaan rather than let it go… indeed, there may well be a “milosevic-in-waiting” somewhere in bangkok already… perhaps of blue blood even…
in sum, i don’t think a seccessionist war is looming (much as it would please hun sen to see it happen!)… rather, i think there will be an evolutionary process of building greater autonomy for the various regions in thailand, beginning with the end of the current reign, and furthered by the regionalism that will grow with increased asean integration and democratization… i do not believe that the 21st century will be a century of the dominant nation state in the way that the 20th was…
we are at the beginning of a generational process, as far as i am concerned… you may disagree, but i believe you would agree that this would be the more desirable scenario 😉
Abhisit at Samak’s funeral
I do not have much faith in “silent majority”, I put more value on the fact than neither reds nor yellows have been able to mobilize substantial crowds with compelling agenda.
Let’s see if reds cancel their upcoming Dec 10 rally, and how many people will show up if they don’t.
I think the days of street politics deciding country’s fate are over.
On Thaksin’s pardon – what do you think the actual number was? At some point there was talk of reaching ten million.
Anwar and Rudd
It is no doubt that national interest is the top priority.
Looking at what your American counterpart has done with Asia, Australia isn’t that bad.
No need to mention ETS….
National interest is the top priority.
Mega projects and Lao transitions
”
[Hydropower projects in Laos] suffer from all the expected deficiencies, which arise from trying to use an EIA process to substitute for civil society mechanisms in an weak military-kleptocrat oligarchy lacking (and actively preventing the development of) almost all the institutions and procedures of a civil society.
The World Bank and ADB do not have the quality of personnel in the field, and do not provide the necessary level of backing from the top, to prevent the mitigation programmes from becoming merely large-scale employment-benefit agencies for poorly qualified well-connected people with no connections to the affected stakeholders.
As a result the actual mitigation measures would make any professional in the field of tropical agriculture, rural livelihood intensification, smallholder irrigation, land tenure, public health and water supply think they had moved back about a century.
Utterly pathetic by international standards in these fields.
So there is a substantial risk that a well-organised NGO might just do
some serious work to reveal the deficiencies of the mitigation works
so far carried out.
However the more serious risks come from impact events which have not yet occurred.
These are:
a) The impacts of the diverted water on the Xe Bangfai drainage
channel, particularly erosion downstream of the diversion canal, and aggravation of flooding as a result of the new sediment transport situation, which will silt up this channel for many decades and possibly even centuries as the new the hydraulic equilibria are reached.
WB, ADB and the Developer have steadfastly refused to address this risk, which properly requires an engineering fix at high costs, presumably because it is so expensive to mitigate that it would remove all the economic benefits of having a diversion (high head for minimum structure cost). By transferring the costs to environmental and social mitigation works, the planners have saved $500,000,000 and committed to spend only tens of millions. This is a massive risk as the NGO’s will eventually become educated enough to compare NT2 diversions with others. When the flooding starts to kick in (it will become evident in about 2013) they could find ways to present the project as being essentially flawed at the conceptual-design level, and compel the owners to become involved in continuous costly emergency works and measures. WB and ADB have fashioned an environment in which NT2 has committed to improve living standards of all affected people. In short the risk exposure is absurdly high.
b) Other Ministries, notably Ministry of Agriculture and the new Land Management Authority are now trying to get in on the benefits of the mitigation budget. MoA is trying to force NT2 to build flood protection bunds. As the Xe Bangfai valley and flood plain is more or less still at its natural state (just a few dodgy flood/irrigation structures), and as developers are about to introduce mechanized farming (rubber, eaglewood, jatropha (biofuel!!!), cassava, sugar cane, Eucaplyptus and Acacia mangium, etc.) extensively and without land use practice control or regulation, to the catchment hills, NT2 could find itself compelled to become involved in flood control works.
These would be greater than the costs of the entire NT2 Project, so only minor, unsatisfactory works will be carried out. Once again NT2 is vulnerable to collect all the opprobrium and to incur significant costs which arise from multiple mostly uncontrollable sources.
c) The rapidly expanding presence of Chinese and Vietnamese operators are already increasing the pressure on the Nakai catchment forests and biodiversity making protection of these resources almost impossible. This will become evident soon from any objective monitoring, and once again NT2 is placed to take all the blame for something over which it has virtually no control, a) for opening up the area b) for not ensuring its measures for protecting the resources are effective.
d) The reservoir water quality will be severely impaired for many years. Biomass clearance is being confused with logging and the NT2 cannot find a way to break free from the military-commercial interests which lock them into restricted procurement of contractors, which would be necessary to solve the problem. Inundation will as a result produce bad smells, dead fish and frenzied NGO reactions publicising the events.
Livelihoods will be damaged in the Xe Bangfai and possibly the Nam Theun. It will take 5 years before a sustainable reservoir fishery could start to be developed, but there will be windfall fishing of colonising species.
NT2 has written a story about how the reservoir will develop which
will seem to be very off-track. Quite normally these events will
trigger a loss of confidence in the project. The Public will perceive
it to be an example of yet another corporate deceit, furnishing high
life styles in the Boardroom and more impoverishment in the fields of
the already impoverished.
Not a great PR exercise for a bank.”
Mega projects and Lao transitions
Question: Would inter-basin transfers of the magnitude of THPC/NT2 would be permitted in most first world jurisdictions?
“This topic is being debated by some research workers. I thought you would be interested to see where the debate is at this stage.
The disallowment is of “inter-basin transfers or large magnitude without engineering works to prevent erosion and river sedimentation”.
Switching large flows from a big river into a small stream without engineering of the recipient channel as far as it takes to prevent erosion and sedimentation is what I have failed to find an example of.
Interbasin transfer of large volumes of water is of course very widespread in developed countries, and involves massive civil
works in tunnels, pipes and channels.
The main legislative thrust in developing countries is about the equitability of the diversion. Do the people who “lose” the water get recompensed? It is assumed that the people who receive the water need it and have got their infrastructure prepared to take it. This is always the case as water transfer is made as part of a very political (and in transboundary situations international relations are involved) process and the justification of the investments is based on every m3 being needed (as the cost of the diversion is based on the design flows).
No community pays to divert water which is not going to be used in high value applications. This demand-use angle ensures the pipes, canals, storage structures, etc, are in place,
Only in regions without civil society process, where water has almost no value, and may be seen as having almost as high a negative as positive value (e.g. developing countries in monsoon regions), one can find NT2 and THPC type aberrations.
One would expect social and political changes in the next 20 years will lead to a realisation that these two schemes only made sense for a
few stakeholders (mostly non-resident) for a short period of time.
Pressure on the IPP’s to make the necessary engineering works to make economic use of the diverted water, and to prevent its adverse effects, will inexorably grow, (it’s already started) making the IPP progressively less economic, until it comes to be operated as an irrigation or fishery control structure, with incidental power generation.
This has happened already with several Thai hydropower projects (e.g. Chulabon). This makes a nonsense of the normal way arriving at net present values of hydropwer projects in developing countries. World Bank and ADB are either unable or unwilling to grapple with the realities of water use and value progressions in developing countries.
They use 30 and 50 year cash flows, supposing water remains a free resource, and that erosion and floods will be tolerated indefinitely, which is pure fantasy.
The opportunity to take advantage of the high returns on water, which its low costs and lack of user-regulation in poor countries permit, has proved irresistible to speculators, and, sadly, to the development banks.
It is a curious paradox that as these countries develop, the development banks will find these projects become uneconomic.
Hydropower in developing countries, for many reasons and not just this one described above, has to be planned very differently from the current IPP model.
It could be argued that the IPP approach has impaired proper use of water for mixed energy-agriculture-consumption in poor countries over many decades into the future. Not very satisfactory for a development bank to hear, particularly as the pressures of climate change adaptation grow.
Is there any contrary argument? “
Mega projects and Lao transitions
“Just a quick outline, and just for you as scientist to scientist.
Usually transbasin diversion just nip off the top of a catchment (e,g Nam Leuk, Nam Mang 3) and use the very high head to ensure low flows are economic. If its done intelligently it can have relatively low impacts and the energy per cumec is high.
Where it has not usually been contemplated, or as far as we can see, implemented, is about the middle of a catchment where flows are large.
At this stage flows are so large that the gains you can get from a “stolen” head tend to be lost in the costs of building the channels needed to manage the discharge from the power station.
THHP and NT2 have avoided all (or in NT2 case) some of these costs by doing it in Laos where they have no deep knowledge of hydropower normal practice.
What makes diversion discharges even more difficult to manage in Laos are:
1. The Monsoon climate (so you tend to get flooding in the recipient river when you are making your highest discharges)
2. Egat’s preference for high capacity export plants which enables them to turn the producer into a peak power supplier in the dry season whether he’s paid for this or not, which in turn means
* very high flows into flooded recipient rivers
* intermittent flows in the dry season with consequent aggravation of erosion and higher turbidity
3. A rural population which lives on (recipient) river flood plains and depends on wet season rice, fisheries, river bank gardens and livestock.
A middle catchment diversion in Laos needs a lot of engineering downsteam of the power station.
It seems that the developers are taking advantage of the situation.
NT2 will be the largest ever (and last?) hydropower basin diversion… No one has ever discharged 100 cumecs into a 5 cumec stream. Data on these types of project are scarce because they are not allowed in most places. … they did some big diversions in Russia and China 40 to 50 years ago, but nothing seems to have entered the internet record yet.
…
There are 1 to 2 degrees centigrade of daily change in the dry season which coincides with opening and closing of the turbine and goes down the river attenuating to very low values at the Mekong. This could get up to 4 degrees when the THXP is operating. What sort of problems would this daily change cause?
…
The erosion of the Nam Hai has increased by between 30 and 60 fold resulting in removal of 8.5-14 million tons of sediment from the Nam Hai banks since 1998. This material has gone into the Hinboun, and a large proportion has settled in the river. As a result there is a sediment wave in the Hinboun which is being continually
enlarged. Equilibrium would be expected to be some time in the future, and it is not a satisfactory equilibrium. As a result of the sediment wave the flooding has been aggravated, and it is now judged by the affected people on the river bank and in the
backwater areas as more risky to grow wet season rice, and more risky to raise livestock. About 5000 families are affected in the Hinboun valley. We have surveyed the losses experienced and in economic terms the average household loss in $150 to $300 per year. Over 8 years the loss amounts to about $11 million to $13
million.
Losses will continue to get worse for some time even if the diversion discharge is canalised to the Hinboun and the THHP discharge is closed in the flooding periods, as we have an accumulating progression going on.
The rice damage is exacerbated by the turbidity in the water resulting from the erosion in the Nam Hai, which provides a significant colloidal component in the suspended sediment. Slower flood drainage, higher water levesl and higher turbidity all combine to produce the risk aggravation reported by farmers and
observed in their abandonment of wet season rice fields. Livestock production suffers from more disease risks during prolonged flooding, and damage to pastures from heavier sediment on grasses and other fodder.
The THPC Mitigation and Compensation Programme does not make much of significant contribution in reversing this impoverishment, as it is too small a programme and poorly distributed, favouring the better off and less affected households, and not yet reaching all affected villages. …
I characterise this as initial ecological “shock” as the new flow and sediment transport/turbidity regime was established, and a slow and slight recovery as new fish populations adapting to the new conditions and dynamics became established and fishermen learnt how to exploit the new situation, leaving the overall
capacity of the river to sustain livelihoods and incomes significantly impaired at the moment. It remains to be seen how much further the changes in the river system, with more frequent and prolonged flooding, and new migration patterns still being
built up by pioneering populations, can bring the system back towards or even past previous productivity levels. I doubt this can be forecast, and there are substantial risks that new impact events (THXP’s enlarged diversion, Pathen mining already
expanding, concession cash cropping effects on the catchment) will deliver further shocks.
Nam Theun 2’s discharge will have very similar effects on the Xe Bangfai rice farming, livestock production and fishing systems.
…
At the present time there is no doubt that the persons consulted and engaged by both THPC and NT2 come from too narrow a range of skills and lack the breadth of experience of fluvial changes and their consequences for river bank dwellers. This is a weakness of both projects, and it reflects the way the Projects have “selected” the skills they needed (or need) to build hydropower projects, without getting bogged down in the downstream problems.
It has been assumed by all parties, including the World Bank, that engineers with hydraulic knowledge can describe the behaviour of rivers, and that social scientists can evaluate the performance of rice plants under inundation and the reactions of aquatic ecosystems to flow and sediment transport changes. This is about the same as expecting a botanist to perform surgery on a cow (they are both biologists), or having a fluvial scientist design a power intake and tunnel.
Certainly they would do a better job than an economist, financial analyst or a lawyer, but it would still not come close to being safe or reasonable.
So we all know this is absurd. Why then do we think engineers know everything about rivers and social scientists know everything about ecology? An even more important question is this. What sort of hydraulic engineer is prepared to make fluvial science judgments, and what sort of social scientist is prepared to
evaluate the effect of flooding on rice crops?
Neither NT2 and THHP have taken their engineering far enough downstream. This is particularly true of THHP. If there is not a proper fluvial science study of the recipient channel downstream of the discharge point of a large diversion which shows the additional flows do not increase erosion and sediment transport
rates, and do not aggravate flooding, then the project is improperly designed. I don’t think this principle can be challenged as it’s already embodied in most of the regulations and laws in almost all the countries which have regulations and laws.
The effect of this design flaw (or defect or malpractice) is in effect to transfer a large amount of the risks and costs of the project to the affected people, relying on a regulation system and mitigation process which is virtually non-functional to remedy the losses.
It is unsound to leave avoidable damage of this magnitude
to be sorted out by mitigation and compensation anywhere in the world, and in countries lacking services and capacity for providing relief, it could be described as reckless.
It appears to me that the international NGO community will end up having to provide rice for the Hinboun farmers, and eventually this may also apply to the Xe Bangfai. This could become a Pak Mun type problem in the future if the Xe Bangfai and Nam Hinboun get blocked with sediment. Both rivers are working their way through limestone reefs and have numerous constriction points. They are not ideal for taking large increased flows, and very far from ideal for movement of sediment.
The proper remedy of this sort of impact event lies in extending the engineering downstream. I know this is more expensive in the short term, but the overall economic losses from a river damaged by a sediment wave in Laos will run to tens of millions of dollars, probably hundreds of millions.
It will be a source of strong and in my opinion legitimate criticism by public interest groups if the appropriate expertise is not applied to analyzing the fluvial systems and production systems of the recipient rivers, and, if necessary implementing engineering and operations modifications to prevent avoidable damage. Only unavoidable damage or unforeseen damage should be left to the mitigation and compensation programmes.”
Abhisit at Samak’s funeral
Nick – like you, until recently when I left Thailand, perhaps for good, I was living in a mixed working class / middle class area.
Two things struck me :
1) the way poorer members of the area were almost fearless in their open support of the Red-shirts – eg. loudly listening to Red-Shirt radio, cheering when they anyone wearing a red-shirt (whether political or not), and those from Isaarn increasingly willing to voice their increasingly brazen, almost break-away Isaarn identity – some to the point of calling Isaarn their “country”.
2) was the still quite evident menace of intimidation from semi-criminal thuggish Yellow-Shirt supporters.
It seems to me much of the Yellow Shirt – and more moderate Royalist reation is coming from a sense of fear and threat : they know they’ve lost Isaarn (ages ago), and Lanna (Chiang Mai, etc.),
that the military is deeply divided, that the police – overwhelmingly Thaksin-supporters – are refusing to be moved
out of their posts in favour anti-Thaksin officers.
I.e. that the “Thai” state is now severely fractured – and that the old levers of reaction seem to only half-work (at brest from their point of view). It seems the reactionaries are terrified of an uprising in Bangkok. They realise they’ve lost Isaarn and Lanna, now almost separate states, if not yet separate nations.
Thailand 1 – Vietnam (and Laos) 1
David – very well said re. democratic pluralism – or lack thereof in both Lao and Thailand.
“Isaarn alone” ?
No – I don’t think so : currently Isaarn – almost ready to break-away from “Thai” dictatorship-disguised-as-democracy, is supported by Lanna (“Thailand’s” North, – eg. Chiang Mai, Chieng Rai, etc.).
The Fourth Army in Lanna, and the Third Army in Isaarn, draw the vast majority of their soldiers fom these areas. And will fight to defend their local people, if Bangkok tries moving troops into these areas for a crackdown : indeed Bangkok has already tried this pressure, without much success.
The Lao government – very reluctantly indeed – would find it difficult to not send its’ small – but far more battle-hardened – military into Isaarn, in aid of any uprising by the Third Army, especially if refugees started pouring across into Laos. This is the worst-case scenario. And then there is Cambodia !
Thailand 1 – Vietnam (and Laos) 1
A Lao speaker from Yasothon confirms the ‘ai-nong’ (same household) vs ‘phi-nong’ (more distant acquaintance) distinction reported here. And a number of urban Thais simply don’t believe it.
Anwar and Rudd
I’m a Rudd fan – and support the PM’s position here.
Lopez is asking Australia to step beyond the bounds of reasonable outside commentary, etc., and into interfering in the internal affairs of an independent state.
Australians already have a far too widespread reputation as over-bearing white-out-post colonialists, all to0 willing to lecture Asians about how to run their countries.
Thank God Rudd has stepped away from t hat stereo-type, this time.
Video of Vietnam’s goal
Pokpong, read Simon’s explanation of what is happening in the video and you will find that the crowd is largely Lao dressed up in support of Vietnam.
An open letter to Kevin Rudd
[…] human rights record. This author had earlier protested Kevin Rudd describing Malaysia as a “robust democracy” for diplomatic […]
One man to rule them all
Susie
You made a very pertinent assessment baout the past 2 decades of “pressure” to change the behavior of the present government. There is neither the C & E or any principles other than the Bash-A-Junta popularity with the democratic west.
Initially was to boycott the SLOR shameful robbing of the result. Then it was save Daw AUng San Suu Kyi with a potpourri of advocacy for “democracy, Human right” mixed in.
Fact:
1) There has not been any historical precedence in applying such “pressure” to a country that has NO threat to any other neighbor, the west or let alone the world.
2) Results of sanction usually are creating a nation even worst than b/f the sanctions are applied.
The West acted without any concrete objectives other Bash-A-Junta or save DASSK therefore resulting in this present:
1)Defiant and intransigence Than Shwe as similar to Castro in Cuba or Kim J I in DPRK.
2) A weaker more submissive citizenry who has no hope put to acquiesce to the dictators just to survive and to avoid being hurt.
Yet the irrelevant debate continue.
Taiwan, The Philippines, even S Korea as example all the while scream out to the fact that only massive economic aids, which these countries received, under the guise of anti communism for over 4 decades continually until the respective citizenry found enough strength in their middle class to boot the respective dictators out of offices permanently. These dictators are known and proven to be comparable in the degree of atrocities, corruptions and all other travesties that will make Than Shwe look like a Monk.
Definitely not Chicken or eggs but Laissez fair with massive amount of aid due to the catch up game the west need to be playing to save a citizenry who has nearly given up in every respect. Not unlike the one in DPRK.
Thailand 1 – Vietnam (and Laos) 1
on the topic of thai-isaan-lao, i had an interesting discussion with a lao friend in vientiane about 2 weeks ago… she said that many of her friends and relatives “on the other side of the river” would gladly “leave thailand” and “join lao”, IF lao had “two governments to choose from, like in thailand”, i.e. democracy…
now of course we can debate the extent to which democracy exists in thailand… after all, the choice of the thai people has been grossly disrespected in the last few years… but i find it highly interesting to note that at least some people in isaan seem to be linking the issue of their ethnic identity and “belonging” to the issue of democracy and political rights…
perhaps even more interestingly, when i suggested to my friend that multi-party democracy might not be coming to the lao pdr anytime soon, she replied “well, then isaan will be alone, only isaan…”
Benedict Rogers on Than Shwe
By the way PlanB, are you someone from the Burma Economic Watch of the Macquarie Uni’s Economics Faculty? Just curious. BEW has an interesting article in their May 2008 Blog written by Dr. Hlaing Myint about some particular events in Delta.