No.139 Seminar ： The Political Ecologies of Industrial Plantation Development and Access to Land in Laos
- Miles KENNEY-LAZAR (The Hakubi Center for Advanced Research/Center for Southeast Asian Studies)
- 2017/12/05 4:30pm
- The Hakubi Center for Advanced Research (Research Administration Building 1F)
- English(This seminar is open for students and researchers at Kyoto Univ.)
Summary
Over the past three decades, the small, landlocked Southeast Asian nation of Laos has transitioned from centralized, state socialism towards a market-oriented economy to generate economic development and reduce poverty. Domestic and foreign investment in industrial agricultural and tree plantations is a central pillar of this new path of development. As of 2011,the government of Laos granted 440,000 hectares of land to investors for medium- to large-scale plantation development projects. While plantation development is broadly associated with economic growth in Laos, its effects on rural development, agrarian livelihoods, and the environment are mixed and depend on the political-economic forms through which plantations are established. Large-scale, mono-culture plantations developed by agribusinesses have led to the displacement of farmers from their lands, polluted soils and streams, cleared forests, and provided little economic compensation or employment in return. Small-scale cash crop and mixed agricultural production, on the other hand, has provided modest, but important, streams of cash income for the limited groups of farmers who have been able to take advantage of crop booms. In this seminar, I explore why different forms of plantation development have emerged in Laos and have differentially impacted rural people. I focus on the politics of access and control over land and forests, which are contested by state agencies, corporate managers, and peasant households. Ultimately, the seminar will show the importance of examining the ways in which human relationships with land and nature are politicized to shape how mono-crop plantations are developed and impact rural environments and livelihoods. The seminar will close with reflections on future research concerning the comparative governing politics of plantation expansion in Laos and Myanmar.