In June 2001, the Thaksin government ordered the gates of Pak Mool dam opened for one year. This decision concealed an implicit confession that the dam’s impact on the ecology of the Northeast’s major river, and on the communities living beside it, far outweigh its very modest contribution to the nation’s electricity.

Government also commissioned several research projects to help decide what should be done with the dam in future. Before this research was finished — or read by the decision makers, or made available for public debate — a government committee headed by Pongphol Adireksan ruled that the gates should be closed for eight months of the year and open for the remaining four.

This committee had attended a preliminary presentation of the major research study by Ubon Ratchathani University. But curiously, the eight-closed/four-open pattern was not even among the four options considered by this research study. And it directly contradicts the report’s main recommendations.

The Ubon University research looked at electricity generation, irrigation potential, and the dam’s social and ecological impact. It concludes that the dam’s electricity generation is modest. The region is connected to the national electricity grid. If the dam were closed, it would entail a slightly higher dependence on supplies from Laos.

The research then discusses the possibility of developing irrigation to compensate for the damage to local fisheries. It is not optimistic. Demand for existing local irrigation sources is already lower than planned. Soil is poor and the costs of pumping high, so most farmers calculate it is uneconomic. Government would have to lower charges, improve the pumping system, build a network of channels, install a management system, and invest in upgrading agriculture to generate water demand. This would be expensive and uncertain of success.

The report then repeats the well-known picture of the dam’s impact on the ecology, fisheries, and plant life of this major river. Among the communities affected, 60 per cent fell below the poverty line. Since the dam gates were opened, incomes have improved but not fully because of the remaining uncertainty. The research dispels the myth that the dam helped develop fish-farming in the upstream zone.

It then discusses four options: close the gates for electricity generation permanently; open for five months; open for eight months; and open permanently. It rejects the option of keeping the gates permanently closed on grounds that the ecological and social costs are too high. The researchers refuse to use simple-minded cost-benefit analysis. What units do you use to measure the benefit of a little extra electricity for the city, against the cost of permanent ecological change and permanent community destruction?

A five-month opening over July to November would allow many of the fish species to migrate, would permit electricity generation at its most productive period, and would damage fishing least because fishing falls off in the flood season anyway. But in the end, the Ubon University research rejects both the five and eight-month options because of the social impact and the long-term environmental costs. The research explcitlly favours opening the gates permanently for at least five years. “The electricity supply can be found from other sources, but the problems of community economics and the ecosystem cannot be solved by technical means.” For the next five years, there is no urgent need for the dam’s contribution of electricity. The time could be used to find better solutions to the social and environmental issues.

How did such a clear research conclusion lead to such a murky decision? Reportedly a senior figure in the university intervened. The Pongphol committee heard his personal opinion, not the research result. Why the committee chose to rule in line with this opinion—and to rule so quickly—is another matter and much more mysterious.

Perhaps it wanted to preempt another path-breaking study. The fishing communities did their own research. “After the dam was opened in June 2001, the fish came back. We realized we had to make a record. If others did the research, it would never be complete and correct. City people don’t know about rivers, fish and rapids like we do. They would have to ask us for the information anyway. So better to do it ourselves.”

A Chiang Mai NGO, SEARIN, provided some technical help. The communities selected an expert panel of 20 fishermen. They caught, identified, photographed, and recorded 148 native species of fish which returned to the river after the dam was opened. They reckon that 123 migrate between the Mun and the Mekhong. They describe in great detail where each one breeds. They list the plants that have returned to the banks and their many uses. They claim that 95 percent of households in 45 villages resumed fishing. They report that divisions and conflicts in the communities diminished when fishing resumed.

This “tai ban” research presents no conclusion and no recommendations. But its message is clear. The fish migrations take place almost throughout the year. After the gates were opened, it took three months for the rapids to clear of silt and become suitable as breeding ground. The ecology of the river and its banks is complex and delicate. The number of communities affected is large. The revival of the river had many secondary effects on the local economy (trade, tourism, vegetable production). In a quietly dispassionate way, this path-breaking essay in real field research makes a strong case for keeping the gates open.

On the day after Thaksin became prime minister, the Pak Mool villagers fed him with som tam and sticky rice, and sang him a song: “After ten years of struggle we’re weak and hungry. Now the fish are gone, we have to come to the city and look for work. Collecting the refuse to make a little cash, so we can eat.”

He promised to be sympathetic. It is now time for him to pay for the som tam and sticky rice, and for the singer.