Thai village disappearing as sea advances 20m per year

From correspondents in Khun Samutchine
December 07, 2009 1:35PM AROUND 60 families have already been forced away from the once idyllic fishing community of Khun Samutchine, as the sea that local people rely on for their livelihood advances inland by more than 20m a year. “I live on somebody else’s land, I can’t escape the village because I’m too poor,” Noo Wisuksin, 71, said as she pointed to the spot in the water where her home used to be decades ago. She is one of 25 million people under threat in Thailand’s vast Chao Phraya river delta, which is sinking because of river damming and the clearing of mangrove forests, as climate change pushes up sea levels. In the past 30 years the sea in Khun Samutchine has swallowed more than one kilometre of land and Noo has moved her house back eight times since to escape the rising tides. Nearby sits the almost-deserted Khun Samut temple, marooned at sea and accessible only by a concrete walkway. A line of electricity pylons pokes out of the water, stretching out to nowhere. Upstream damming along the river basins that feed the Gulf of Thailand have prevented sediment from building up, upsetting the balance with the erosive force of the sea. The clearing of slow-growing mangrove forests to set up shrimp and salt farms has hastened the destruction. … “If we don’t put in any protection against coastal erosion, more than half of Bangkok province will disappear,” Panadda Tedsiri, organiser of the Thai Community Foundation, said. …

Thai village disappearing as sea levels rise 20m a year via Apocadocs