2. The flood in the Lower Mekong River Basin (cont')
2.4 The socio-economy
In the past 15 years, economies within the LMB area have begun to change. Although the majority of people still earn their livelihoods from a combination of subsistence farming, supplemented by fishing and foraging from wetlands and forests, other sectors began to develop in the 1980s and 1990s.
Agriculture is the single most important economic activity in the LMB. Overall, an estimated 75% of the LMB population earn their livelihood from agriculture, in combination with other activities such as fisheries, livestock, and/or forestry. Agriculture in the LMB is divided into two main categories – subsistence and commercial.
Subsistence farmers typically grow enough rice for household
consumption, sometimes with a small surplus to
sell. Shifting cultivation, which involves clearing forested
areas and farming plots on a rotational basis, is practiced
extensively in upland areas in the Viet Nam Central Highlands,
in northeast Cambodia, and in upland Lao PDR. An estimated 70%
of the people who live in the LMB are subsistence farmers. They
supplement the rice they grow with the wild fish they catch
and plants and animals foraged from nearby forests and wetlands
for use as food and medicines.
Production of rice and fish (in a natural
environment or in fishponds) constitute the two basic activities
for most inhabitants of the Mekong region. These activities
are regulated according to flood and drought periods. Intensity
of floods and droughts, and possible human mitigation, are key
social and economic stakes.
In the lowlands, where soil and access to inputs and markets are all good, agriculture is becoming increasingly commercial and profitable now that all four LMB governments have adopted free market systems. For some years farmers in the Korat Plateau in Northeast Thailand, have practised commercial farming of single crops such as tobacco and sugarcane. In Viet Nam's Mekong Delta, commercialisation of rice farming has made the country the world's second highest exporter of rice. Although commercial agriculture is largely confined to lowland areas, lowland farmers have been encouraged to resettle in the Central Highlands in Viet Nam to grow cash crops such as coffee, tea and rubber. Irrigation and flood control infrastructure are increasing in the lowland areas of the basin to enable production of a second and even a third rice crop, dry season or perennial cash-crops, and to expand wet season production.
The Mekong's fishery is of huge importance to the people who live in the Lower Mekong Basin. Most of the 12 million rural households in the LMB fish as well as farm, and fish is the main source of animal protein in most people's diets. An estimated 40 million rural dwellers are involved in the fishery at least part-time or seasonally. In Cambodia more than 1.2 million people who live in fishing areas around the Tonle Sap Lake depend almost entirely on fishing for their livelihood. Annual fish yield for the Tonle Sap Great Lake in Cambodia is estimated at 230 kg per hectare, a figure much higher than that of other Asian floodplain fisheries, whose average is about 100 kg per hectare per year. The Mekong River has one of the most abundant fisheries in the world and is probably the world's largest river fishery. The annual catch is an estimated 1.5 million tonnes, with another 500,000 tonnes raised in reservoirs and other forms of aquaculture.
The forestry sector covers commercial logging, private and commercial gathering of fuel wood, and the harvesting of non-timber forest products (NTFPs). Countries in the LMB consume most of the wood they produce, but there is significant flow between countries. Cambodia and Lao PDR produce a surplus and Thailand and Viet Nam import wood from these two countries. Non-timber forest products include wildlife, wild fruits, medicinal plants, resins, gums, precious woods, rattan and bamboo. Although not included in official forest valuations, NTFPs are important sources of income for millions of people, as well as sources of food and cash for farmers during poor harvest years.
Forests and wetlands play an essential
role in the basin, not only for the biodiversity they support
but also as flood regulators. Forest covering reduces runoff
and wetlands increase water storage capacity. Any human contribution
toward reducing the forest and wetlands areas can increase the
peak of water level in the Mekong and its tributaries.
Wetlands constitute an essential resource in the LMB. Basin residents commonly harvest at least 20 species of aquatic plants for food, with surpluses sold in local markets. In seasonally flooded areas along the Songkhram River in Thailand and other tributaries in Lao PDR, Thailand and Cambodia, bamboo shoots are harvested for food and for income generation. Other commonly consumed wild plants include watercress, water chestnuts and aquatic ferns. Water ferns and water cabbages feed ducks, cows and pigs. Medicinal uses of aquatic plants include eliminating parasites, reducing fevers and reducing inflammation. A study of one lakeside community listed 35 species of wetland plants that were used for medicinal purposes.
Wetlands also provide an essential biological system for fish reproduction. The large floodplain areas in the Mekong Delta and around the Tonle Sap Great Lake in Cambodia are crucial nursery habitats. Deep pools and channels in the mainstream of the Mekong near Kratie in Cambodia, in the Nam Theun and Nam Hinboun Rivers in Lao PDR, and in the Se San River in Cambodia are important dry season refuges for fish, which re-colonise the floodplain when waters rise with the next rainy season. Many important commercial species swim hundreds of kilometres across borders from the Mekong Delta in Viet Nam, through Cambodia to Thailand or Lao PDR via the Mekong River mainstream; to Lao PDR via the Se Kong River; or, to the Central Highlands in Viet Nam via the Se San and Sre Pok Rivers. The species migrations are essential for the success of the Mekong's fishery. Although rivers and their associated floodplains encompass a range of different fish habitats, they are all ecologically linked to a complex "fish migration network".
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