RPCVguy

What is happening here? Even if we get a spell of bad weather blame the government? Can't you guys at least try and be a bit more positive?

AsianAdvisor, on 2012-05-07 14:09:23, said:

I have been living in North Thailand for more than 22 years and do tree planting projects. There are more trees planted every year so  forests are doing well. The problem is we have more moisture than we have had for the previous years and this is all new to everyone. It is not deforestation but management. Every day I see and hear the cloud seeding planes. Better than a massive drought like in Africa, I think, just my opinion.  What have you done?

If would like I will send you photos of myself and our expat friends and clients planting trees, helping orphans and poor villagers. Easy to sit back and talk about the problem but what have you done to help. Sorry to say many expats take from the people and natural beauty of Thailand and do not give back. If you want to know more how many of us expats help those in need and the environment send me an email. Lets work together to9 provide a better place to live and help others not so fortunate as us.

Cheers,
Randy

What's all the fuss about, May is the start of the rainy season and this is the norm. Some areas get more than others. Eventually the whole of Thailand will get the monsoon rains and flooding is the norm as well the rivers and causeways cant cope, because the fools keep throwing junk into them. It was only last week that 40 or 50 Provences were in drought and because of the extreme hot weather and no rain the earth was cracking and they were worried about the foundations of buildings in Bangkok and other areas. Cant have it both ways. This is life in Thailand.

Flash Flood

A flash flood is caused by excess water, usually from a storm. This usually happens downstream from the storm as heavy rains produce more water than the area can handle with nothing to impede its buildup or soak it into the ground.

As a weatherman in Oklahoma recently put it: "It is when a large rain and storm system hovers an area and does 'not leave' or 'move on' (as generally seen with systems) but instead stays, dumping supernatural amounts of water in a "flash," overwhelming even the more extraordinary and multi-competant drainage and levy systems."

This would not have happened 20 years or so ago but massive deforestation has increased the run off so that water (more of it) just gets to lower ground more quickly.

Something is very fishy. Several hours later and USGS has reported no earthquake in Phuket
http://earthquake.us...n/Australia.php
Maybe sonic booms? There are sometimes 2 seperate booms from high altitude planes.

I'm skeptical because the USGS didn't report this quake - and still hasn't, now, six hours after it was supposed to have happened.

On the other hand, several friends felt a significant jolt around that time in Patong.

I've submitted the observation to the USGS. Let's see if they can find two quakes in their data.

Forestry is a lot like the burning in the north (and sometimes the same).  They've been trying to stop people from burning for years, despite knowing where it is happening and this year was one of the worst yet.  I'd say things are not getting any better.  I hate to see how the local farmer doesn't plan for the future or how to protect the land for his children but, Thai culture is a big ship to turn.  They don't look any further than today.  Floods?  What floods...it's dry!

Fact : Paying people to plant trees is far less costly than trying to move and rehouse 2 million people.

Having first hand knowledge on this subject, we are advised to clear my wifes section of forest.

In Nan province (near Wiang Sa) the government has been allocating sections of the forest to local Thai people who have traditionally lived in the forest. My wife received 50 rai from her village head-man. In order to secure the chanote on that area, the head man is advising her to clear her section of forest in order to prove that she is working the land, which will secure her title to the chanote when they are issued, at a later date.
All the villages in the area are being given the same advice.

I would prefer the forest to be left 'as is', but don't want her to lose her entitlement.

canuckamuck, on 2012-03-31 21:22:36, said:

My people are Hmong, Karen, Lisu and poor Thai in a Hilltribe school (teacher for English, traditional medicine and Buddhist ethics). They learn quickly, we have biofarming, a fish farm, handicraft teaching with devoted teachers. No curriculum, surviving with your own mind and hands is our aim. We are supported by a Princess Sirindhon foundation and a German charity group.
Small money, but it works.

A photo of my kindergarten kids, ethnies are mixed, they are all little Buddhas.
Who wants them to send to hell?

When I was living at Wat Thaton temple in 1993 the government gave trees to the hill tribe people there and showed them how to plant them then take care of them and paid them to do so. They planted tens of thousands, watered them during the dry season and kept the weeds away. Today the area around the temple and the villages behind the temple are a wash in large native beautiful trees. They even planted a few wild mango and other wild fruit trees so the villagers could pick fruit to eat when in season.

I live in a mountainous area. I have been here for 10 years. The tree line is slowly moving up the mountain due to encroachment. This year there was a lot of wind when they lit the while mountainside. A lot of trees have been damaged. Where I live is a mayor watershed area. A few years ago PTT invested millions of baht for new trees. The forester who initiated the project took good care. For the first three years he had people watching the area during the burning season. Then he moved and the project was taken over by a new forester. I was told, he didn't want to spend any money on this project. The year after fires went through the young trees. Many died, few remained. This year they finished the job and most of the trees are gone. And this is a major watershed area. The people who burn these mountains also use the water for their garlic and potatoes.


Why do they burn? For personal gain. Some say it keeps the forest from being burned by lightning before the rainy season starts but I've heard mushroom picking, hunting and livestock as the main motive. So when did all go well? A man from this village was sitting on the road every day. Watching the forrest. He was taking care nobody would go in the forrest to burn it. And nobody did. A local was involved. Also, the main culprits were paid off. The headman knows who is burning these woods. The main reason things went wrong is that money flowed into peoples pocket, the new forester, instead of where it should go: maintaining the forests.


Moving 2 million people? Where? I have seen this village grow from bamboo huts to nice houses. People worked hard. Do they want to move it all? Yeah, we live in teak houses. We live in the forest and cutting a tree for a house doesn't damage the forest. You have to get the people who live in these forests involved. They know the forest and they could maintain them. Pay them to keep it lush. Make it their living.

anterian, on 2012-03-30 16:58:15, said:

Actually, primitive people usually live in relative harmony with the land. The native North American people had close spiritual ties with the land. The traditional Karen agricultural practices maintained healthy forests.  It is "civilization" that tends to harm the land. And one can make a strong argument that it is modern capitalism that is the primary cause of the worst environmental damage to the planet whether it be forests or the oceans.  At its heart, capitalism is an extractive economic model that will extract until nothing remains.  Whether it be major oil spills in Baku or the Gulf of Mexico, deforestation in Brazil and Indonesia, the Japanese fishing fleet's drift netting, or global warming, the one unifying root cause of the inevitable environmental collapse of the planet is that capitalism is the economic model of the ruling elite just about everywhere.

I wonder how they will handle the loss of the Thai coffee market seeing how Thailand's Arabic coffee comes from most of the hill tribes.