Local knowledge in a forestry development project of 1980s Burma

As worldwide interest in sustainable forest management continues, this paper aims to contribute to the debate about the direction of the flow of science and knowledge by adding information that hybridity of knowledge occurred in international projects. As a case study, I selected a forestry development project of Burma called Forestry Project II East Pegu Yoma Project, funded mainly by the World Bank in the 1980s. By analysing the reports of this project, I attempted to find what kind of local knowledge was adopted, and to explain why that happened. The reports showed that they focused on logging teak (Tectona grandis) for export and establishing tree plantations, and they used techniques that came from the past, such as elephants and floating for logging, and the taungya method for planting, alongside modern techniques. The reasons why the project selected local species, activities and methods were considered to be because: (1) the then government intended to earn foreign exchange from exporting teak logs; (2) teak forestry had a long history in Burma, and the organisations, institutions and techniques aiming for sustainable yield already existed; (3) the project considered that local methods were suitable for particular ecological and socioeconomic conditions

Environmental resource management · Geography · Political science · Regional science · Asian Geopolitics and Ethnography · Cambodian History and Society · Environmental Science · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies · Forestry