The traditional way to claim the life of a pla beuk was to go out in a wooden boat and throw a homemade spear or fibrous net laden with rocks at each corner. But now China wants to kill them another away – with bombs.
The company charged with developing a trade route along the Mekong River (the state-owned Chinese Communications Construction Company) is set to dynamite river islands on a 900-kilometre section of the river
...but in the Mekong it wants to demolish islands in order to make the river more navigable
This section of the river has been navigable for decades for cargo boats carrying about 60 tonnes or more....
And it plans to open up the Yunnan-to-Luang Prabang stretch of the Mekong to 500-tonne cargo barges.
Despite the bigger boats and the faster travel times, the economic impetus may be less important to China than political drivers. China will be lending money and providing credit lines – to the tune of US$10 billion – to the various Mekong nations. And it can leverage this debt to push forward with its own interests in the region.
The impact of this changing water flow on food and water security has not yet been calculated — if it ever could be — but the risks are enormous.
At the moment, the Mekong River is known to be the most biodiverse river in the world — after the Amazon. But if the river islands are bombed away and if the riverscape is engineered into something more like a large artificial canal, then endangered species, including pla beuk, face extinction.
Full article
https://theconversation.com/whats-at-st ... kong-77726