Chapters 4 & 5

Karenni backlog: Karenni refugees fleeing into Mae Hong Son at the onset of a border war in 1995 are forced to wait as a truck smuggling in logs gets bogged down. ©James Fahn

Chapters 4 and 5 examine the fate of Southeast Asia’s forests. Steeped in myth and teeming with rare and fantastic creatures, the region’s vast tracts of jungle are now rapidly dwindling, and probably arouse more concern than any other environmental issue. Some studies suggest that freeing up markets has exacerbated deforestation; others contend that governments merely need to do a better job of handing out property rights to improve stewardship. But as my investigation of a murky teak-smuggling operation along the Thai-Burma border reveals in chapter 4, these academic concerns seem irrelevant on the ground, where corruption, intrigue and violence are of far greater moment. In this case, the illicit trade in teak became tangled up with a minority group’s armed struggle for autonomy and the plight of refugees fleeing from a strife-torn land, resulting in the outbreak of a small border war.

<< Forests and Farmers: The hill tribes are at the center of the Man and Forest debate in Thailand. ©James Fahn Karen children from Mae Chanta: their ultimate fate, and that of the surrounding Thung Yai Wildlife Sanctuary, is hugely symbolic for the Man and Forest debate. @James Fahn

The issues surrounding logging actually seem straightforward compared to those which arise when looking at the other major cause of deforestation in Southeast Asia: encroachment by poor farmers, a subject I examine in chapter 5. Attempts to conserve the region’s remaining forests are increasingly clashing with the interests of villagers such as the ethnic Karen living in Thailand’s remote Thung Yai Naresuan Wildlife Sanctuary. This dispute reveals some fundamental differences in how each of us views our world, in particular how we view nature. Americans tend to equate nature with wilderness, and so have created vast reserves devoid of people. Europeans tend to equate nature with the countryside, which is why they go to such lengths to protect their agricultural heritage. In Asia, on the other hand, the opposition of many environmentalists to the creation of national parks suggests that most greens in the developing world are primarily concerned with environmental justice.