[HotDolly]

Hi together

I'm currently writting an paper about the "Assembly of the poor" movement from the 90ties. One point is the relationship of NGO activist (mostly with middleclass background and almost always educated in BKK universities) and the villagers (mostly uneducated and cannot speak fluently central thai).

Im missing alot of information about the NGO organisations from Thailand, because I cannot read thai, and there not many book in english. One of them I have "The Assembly of the Poor in Thailand" from Bruce D. Missingham.

My question. Can anybody explain me about the following NGOs:
- Friends of the People
- Student Federation of Thailand
- NGO-CORD
- Union for Civil Liberties

I wrote this post, because the NGOs all contribute to the movement but I have very little background information about them?

If anybody knows anything, I would be grateful to listen!

Sawadee khrap

[LOVEBoy]

This doesn't answer your questions but it's an opinion piece about the Assembly of the Poor from today, Feb 19

Beacon of hope in the hills

The Assembly of the Poor is still alive and well. So is its determination to pressure the government into solving land rights problems.


That message was loud and clear when hundreds of villagers staged a protest at Government House early this week.

The Assembly of the Poor champions different grassroots causes. But land rights tops its concerns because millions of people have been turned into forest encroachers by authoritarian forestry laws. Is there any way out beyond street protests? Is there any other solution when the community forest bill has been distorted beyond recognition?

Head for mountainous Tambon Mae Yuam in Mae Hong Son's Mae Sariang district for a glimmer of hope.

Like forest dwellers in other parts of Thailand, the Mae Yuam hill people are subject to eviction and imprisonment by forestry laws, even though they have been living there for centuries. Their ecological farm rotation system has also been vilified as slash and burn to legitimise state eviction drives.

Like other villagers in national parks, they have been through bitter conflict with forestry officials, until they decided to take knowledge back into their own hands.

When the state authorities refused to recognise the forest dwellers' farm rotation plots or to listen to their folk knowledge in ecological farming and forest conservation, Pa-korn Kangwanpong, head of Mae Yuam Tambon Organisation Administration, decided to give it a touch of authority through modern technology.

He did it by helping the hill people build a digital land use database to gain state acceptance.

Since state participation is crucial, the TAO boss organised several town hall meetings for the villagers, forestry and district officials to discuss the need to build up a land use database for the whole tambon of Mae Yuam. Every party agreed that such information was necessary as terms of reference to settle land disputes and to contain further encroachment.

After mastering GPS technology, the hill peasants took the modern tool to locate each farm plot for computerised mapping. They did not do it alone though, but with a team of TAO, district and forestry officials. "The availability of modern technology is helpful. But more important is the will of the communities and team participation from state officials," stressed Mr Pa-korn.

For transparency and accuracy, more town hall meetings were held to show the land plot database for community approval. Interestingly, seeing the big picture has strengthened the villagers' conservation awareness. Apart from agreeing not to farm outside old plots, they have also set up strict forest conservation rules for the whole tambon.

For example, tree-cutting and wildlife poaching is totally prohibited in national parks. So is land-clearing of old plots by fire unless there is a firebreak. Those who want timber for house-building must get approval from the village committee first. The timber must come only from the woods specially set aside for community use.

As a community database, all farm plots in Mae Yuam are shown in the 1:4000 map on public display at the TAO office. It reminds forestry officials to accept the villagers' way while cautioning the villagers against new land-clearing.

To strengthen confidence in land security, each villager is given an informal document showing the sites of their land plots.

What did forestry officials say to this?

"The national park is huge," said Mr Pa-korn. "But there are only a few forestry officials to guard the forest. So I simply asked them if they want the villagers to help them or not?"

Now the Mae Yuam participatory forest conservation model based on modern database is expanding to other districts, thanks to support from Thailand Research Fund.

"If we can expand this effort to the whole of Mae Hong Son, we can use it to bargain for policy change with the government," said Mr Pa-korn.

"We can make it happen if state officials understand the reality on the ground and if the villagers are strongly committed to preserving their forests."

These are big if's. So thanks, Mae Yuam, for being our beacon of hope.

Bangkok Post

[LOVEBoy]

This is only my personal opinion, and I am not Thai, just live here, but my feeling is that the administration probably feels NGOs are a thorn in their side, making "unreasonable demands". Then again there are NGOs here that look after underprivileged Thais and others care for asylum seekers and illegal immigrants, so it's a broad question really.

I was in the heart of the capital a few weeks back and saw what I can only describe as a little tent city, lots of makeshift shacks, on the outside of Sanam Luang. Apparently they are dirt-poor farmers from the north who had had their land taken off them for defaulting on loans. It made me feel sick to see this in such a rich area of the city. I think they part of that Assembly of the Poor.

[HotDolly]

Thank you both very much for the interesting informations!

I nearly finished my paper, but I always like to know more about the topic and Thailand in general!

It would be interesting to know what thai people think about NGOs in general. I heard NGOs are not much liked, but I didn't find out why!

If anybody knows something about it, I would be glad to know...

[Gogogo]

I think this will help you on some of your questions:

Here

Another

A PDF formatted file

I hope this will help.