Such practices have, in many cases, been abandoned under the pressure of uncontrolled market forces and state-imposed development projects. Profit-driven technologies have impoverished peasant and indigenous communities. Displaced farmers are eventually pushed into the hoards of migrant workers that crowd into Bangkok every year. Nonetheless, with the deepening crisis of orthodox development strategies, alternatives aimed at reviving traditional practices of sustainable development are now under way all over the Asia-Pacific. Two notable success stories are worthy of mention.
Mangrove forests are a vital component of complex coastal ecosystems in the tropics.
Yet they have been ravaged with breathtaking speed by logging concessions, destructive fishing practices and especially by prawn or shrimp farming. In Thailand between 1969 and 1989 the mangrove forest area declined by 50 per cent. But villagers in Si Kao and Kan Tang districts in the southern province of Trang have successfully created a 250-hectare community mangrove forest. Destructive fishing methods have been effectively banned. Since the fishing was stopped, marine life and other indicators of coastal ecology have improved dramatically.