Thailand

A Thai environmental auditing firm has confirmed that it is assessing the fallout from a trio of plantations in Oddar Meanchey province that Thai sugar giant Mitr Phol abandoned in late 2014 amid mounting accusations of land grabbing.

Three local NGOs have filed a com­plaint with international sug­ar industry group Bonsucro for re­admitting Thai sugar giant Mitr Phol even though thousands of fam­ilies forced off the company’s for­mer plantations in Oddar Mean­chey province have yet to be fully compensated.

Some six years after about 2,000 families were pushed off 19,000 hectares of land that was converted to plantation for sugarcane, which is processed into sugar used by Coca-Cola.

This paper aims to study the situation of land grabbing and its impacts on small-scale farmers in 5 countries, namely Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.

A leader of a group trying to seize a 1,400-rai oil palm plantation run by Thai Pattana Co, a joint operation of a foreign investor and his Thai business partner, was shot dead while leaving the farm on motorcycle.

Mitr Phol Sugar Corp has pulled out of its three plantations in Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey province after years of allegations about illegal business practices and human-rights abuses, a media report said Monday.

Asia’s largest sugar producer, Thailand’s Mitr Phol Sugar Corporation, has withdrawn from its three plantations in Oddar Meanchey province in Cambodia following years of criticism over alleged illegalities and human rights abuses at the concessions.

The “blood sugar” plantations in Cambodia have been accused of violently evicting villagers in order to raze farmland and build their plantations. Representatives from Coca-Cola and Pepsi said they are not aware of sugar in their supply chain supplied by rights violators.

On February 11, Chai Bunthonglek, a land rights activist from Klong Sai Pattana village and member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand was gunned down. Four locals have been slain in similar attacks since 2010.

Le 11 février 2015 vers 18h30, un inconnu a abattu le défenseur du droit à la terre M. Chai Bunthonglek chez lui dans le district de Chaiburi, dans la province de Surat Thani.

Myanmar may go back to being one of the world's major rice exporters in five to 10 years, as many Thai and foreign investors are looking to expand in rice mills and farms in the country.

The Philippine Palm Oil Development Council wants government to support its road map of developing 300,000 hectares for oil palm in the next ten years with Mindanao as a main investment area.