Are We Prepared for Whatever Comes After Recovery?
There seems to be a consensus on China being the principal engine that will power the world out of the current recession. That may well be, but what will follow the recovery? Recent global discussions culminating in the G-20 meetings in Pittsburg last week would seem to indicate that no one is interested in comprehensively addressing that question and nothing much would substantively change, especially in the area of the relentless pursuit of economic growth. Every country will attempt to increase income and consumption even if part of the consumption serves no useful purposes whatsoever – taking a dune buggy out for a spin to burn gasoline and tearing up a hillside which will erode when it rains.
China will be the principal engine, not only to power the world out of recession but also to lead the charge toward further growth. A week does not go by without some report of China signing major deals to lock up more resources, for it wishes to ensure that its pursuit of growth would not be hampered by insufficient raw materials. What this implies few seem to pay attention to.
With China locking up a lot resources, the rest of the world will fight for whatever remains. The major economic powers, of course, will do all right as they have already planned ahead. Poor countries, on the other hand, will be increasingly at the mercy of others and the gap between the haves and the have-nots will continue to widen.
China will continue to grow at a higher rate than most, if not all, countries for quite some time. That means China will continue to be a leading polluter of the environment and the Yangtze will continue to be the largest polluter of the ocean. A lot of what China produces will be exported and the world will continue to consume a great deal of cheap but poorly made goods. We have all heard about milk containing melamine, toys containing banned substances and animal food containing cardboard. Importers and consumers in rich countries with better education and more vigilant monitoring will be able to avoid most of such goods. Consumers in poor countries lacking resources but with rampant corruption will not be able to do so. For those who wish to learn about how substandard goods get made in China, especially as a result of unethical business practices, I strongly recommend a book by Paul Midler entitled Poorly Made in China: An Insider’s Account of the Tactics behind China’s Production Game.
With increased prosperity, the Chinese will seek to consume more of the most exotic food – shark’s fin, bird’s nest, snake, lizard, turtle, and pangolin. Some of these animals are being smuggled out of their habitats by the truckloads. What this will do to the biodiversity of their habitats should be quite obvious.
One resource that China has not been able to lock up with the signing of long-term agreements is water. China will continue to face water shortages and will try to sequester all the water that flows through its territory. For this reason, it has begun constructing a series of dams on the headwaters of the Mekong River. Once these dams are complete, the way of life in the downstream countries – Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam – will be severely impacted; some may even be destroyed, in particular of Cambodians’. This is because during the monsoon season, the water in the Mekong River pushes the Tonle Sap River to flow backwards into the Tonle Sap Lake and floods most of Cambodia. In that water grow abundant fish upon which most Cambodians depend. When China is able to impound the Mekong water, Cambodians will no longer have the predictable annual floods and abundant fish. What are they going to do? For those who wish to read up on this issue, I recommend a book by Fred Pearce, When the Rivers Run Dry: Water – the Defining Crisis of the Twenty-First Century.
I had once hoped that the present economic crisis would lead world leaders to rethink the values of unending pursuit of ever increasing income and consumption. That apparently is not going to happen. So, poor countries, including the not-so-poor in Southeast Asia, had better start preparing themselves for the consequences.
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Article by Dr.Sawai Boonma
First Published in The Bangkok Post, September 30,2009.
The root of all major development problems in Thailand is the leadership or lack of it.
As someone said “the manager does things right but the leader does the right things”.
We have so many blessings : fertile soil, abunddant rain, no regular devastating natural disasters,..but perhaps the serious culprit is Thai people ourselves.
We have to wake up and do the right things now otherwiseThailand may end up a failed state.
Well said, Khun Pichit.