Exploring the Mekong River through Radio Free Asia's "Mekong Diaries" Video Project

Last week, I took a short 20 minute walk from ERI's offices to visit Radio Free Asia (RFA) where, together with other like-minded people, I travelled down the Mekong River, from the source to the mouth, learning about the manifold cultures living alongs its banks. Several of the 26 video clips filmed by RFA Mekong Team travelling from the source to the end of the river were screened and panels, including the team members, shared comments and thoughts on a range of issues related to the river with the audience. 

The opening clip – the source of the Mekong – presented the unspoiled beauty of the Tibetan Plateau and the local nomadic lifestyle. Watching this gorgeous footage awakened memories of my own trip to the Mongolian Plateau in 2006, and made me desperately want to return. No doubt RFA's video team feel the same way watching their own film – longing to leave all worries behind and enjoy a cup of Tibetan salty tea under a black tent. 

Tibetan nomads living relatively close to the source view the Zachu - the local name for the Mekong river - as sacred and find spiritual support rather than seeking practical benefit from it, for example, by fishing. With the Tibetan practice of river burial of babies, the nomad does not eat what comes out of the water. They are content with their life: grass for grazing animals, food to eat, yaks to milk, and their monastery of monks. Claiming that overgrazing is threatening the source of China’s three major rivers, the Chinese government resettles the nomad in new towns with concrete fences, which keeps them confined and isolates them from traditional employment or economic activity. Despite the Chinese government’s efforts to make Tibetan religious and living culture conform to China’s, ordinary Tibetans and pilgrims living with Zachu keep their life from being touched by history.

Driving south and following the Mekong, the team witnesses lineal progress from living along the river to using the river.  The heart and soul of Southeast Asia, the Mekong River sustains more than 60 million people from Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, who depend on the river and its tributaries for food, water, transportation and many other aspects of their daily lives. Their livelihoods are threatened by dams built and planned by China for hydropower development. Until 1995, there was no mainstream dam in the Mekong River. Fast economic growth in China necessitates surging demand for energy and power. Yunnan Province, where the first mainstream dam was built and where 12 dams are already under construction, is the beginning of the story about the dam development and the costs. The first dam forced more than 5000 people to leave their homes and relocate up the mountain without adequate compensation. People in downstream nations along its thousands of winding miles are already experiencing impacts many claim are caused by just the first few Chinese dams.     

"Mekong lovers"– those who fish for food and making a living – corroborated the assertion of extensive impact of dams on fish biology and ecology. Starting in 1996 when the first dam on Mekong mainstream was fully operational, the flow became increasingly unpredictable.  While the Mekong lovers used to read the tide, now it rises all of a sudden. The irregular tide negatively affects giant catfish spawning. Previously when the water rose, the fish laid eggs naturally. But as the tide rises and falls unpredictably, fish no longer came or lay eggs. The dam serves as a barrier to breeding not only by causing unreliable tide but also by blocking migration. While most species in the Mekong migrate to feed and to breed, dams in critical channels prevent the fish from migrating up and down devastating fisheries on a large scale.  The dam is also alleged to cause floods in downstream nations. Houses and farms in Ratanakiri province, Cambodia, were unprecedentedly flooded in 2009. The local people believe that the release of excess rainwater from overburdened dams in Vietnam has catastrophic impacts on their community downstream in Cambodia.

Development alongside the river does not always come with a negative pushback for the local people. The team’s final destination in China was Jinghong, where industrialized rubber plantations spread so dramatically that they have almost replaced traditional rice farming. As the new industry brought them modern homes with TV and electricity, people interviewed by RFA appeared content with the advent of the rubber plantations. Those who were forced to be relocated on the upper bank of the reservoir as the third dam in Jinghong became operational, also seemed to prefer to live in new homes with TVs bought with their compensation money.

Despite the benefits from development, the satisfaction is fragile when it comes to security. For the Mekong lovers, fish is an indispensable source of protein, and once the fish are gone, food security becomes a critical issue. Without access to fish, dependence on foreign and non-traditional sources for protein makes them vulnerable. The same is true of the rubber industry. Once an economy becomes based on a single crop, the whole society can be affected by the value of the rubber. Policy decision on Mekong development must consider food security issues as well as environmental concerns.

The RFA team also covers the political and economic aspects of life along the river. In Burma, the military regime has officially declared combat against drug production. However, local residents in Shan State, in northeastern Burma, said the army is actually a main participant in the illicit drug trade. The drugs are also plaguing ethnic minorities in the state. After a husband is conscripted or forced to work under the army, his wife not only raises the family but also keeps the kids from drugs in the village where one in four is reportedly addicted.

One of the clips featured casinos in the golden triangle where three countries – Myanmar, Burma and Laos – meet. Here, a new form of Chinese colonization is taking place. Many of the casinos, owned by Chinese, hired Laotians at the beginning. Later on, they were replaced by Chinese, who, Chinese casino managers argue, are a better fit the job than Laotians.

The panel discussion at RFA also considered the role of “Mekong River Commission” – an advisory body established in 1995 by an agreement between Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. Its core function is to provide the four countries with information on various issues involving development. Since it lacks the membership of China and Burma, they, while free to participate in a process, have no obligation to consult with other countries on such issues as building dams.

A fundamental and long-standing question that arises is how to find a balance between development and the lives of the millions who depend on the river. For example, dam proponents argue that hydropower is a cleaner and better solution to energy shortage than fossil fuels. Opponents point to hidden dangers such as huge changes to river hydrology as well as the well-known social cost of relocating local people.

A certain development plan may make the pie bigger by increasing the aggregate utility of society. In other words, those who benefit from the electricity generated by the dam might be willing to pay enough money to make the displaced people happier than before. But this does not mean that hydroelectric dams are “sustainable.  As with, for example, nuclear power, even if consumer groups are willing to pay enough for the electricity to offset all the currently-perceivable costs, environmental economists, whose task is to quantify the benefits and losses caused by a development project, often lack the tools to measure utility for future generations. On a longer term, the consequences of big dams to geologic and ecological systems are severe. A big dam holds back sediments and results in a drop in soil productivity. Like in the Mekong River, increasing numbers of fish are moving closer to extinction. Eventually it is future generations who will live with depleted soil and the extinction of currently endangered species – just as they will live with the long-term effects of radioactive waste from nuclear plants. Contemporaries exploit common resources available now, and the tragedy of the exploitation falls on our sons and daughters. 

In this sense, the precautionary principle reminds us of the truth that even if the benefits to society at large of big mainstream dams exceed the costs to local people, the consensus of contemporaries cannot be a substitute for a decision by those who will live there.

DOng Keun Lee is a second-year law student at Washington University in St. Louis. He is currently interning with ERI's legal program in Washington DC.