Of Forests and Trees - Continued

 

A mountain style saw mill. One two-man saw in action
 and a second saw being sharpened.

A look at the previous post (Titled “O Christmas Tree”) talks of how cutting trees, even on one’s own land, was illegal. All trees belonged to the government and could not be cut. But people needed to build houses so there was a loophole in that people could cut dead trees. So, to cut short a tree’s life, it was common to see trees “girdled”. After girdling, the trees would soon die and could then be cut.

Another loophole to the law was that once a piece of lumber was nailed to a house, it was legal. No questions were asked about where the board had come from. Many village houses were built on “stilts” so the living quarters were elevated above the ground with open space underneath.  The result of the loophole was that it was common to see numerous boards nailed haphazardly around the posts holding up the houses. It was obvious these boards served no real purpose, but once nailed to the house they were legal and could be stored until they could fulfill their real purpose.

For most people in the countryside villages and small towns of northern Thailand, the system to get lumber for a building project involved first, setting up an illegal saw mill out in the forest. Since tree cutting was illegal, chain saws were also illegal. But, there were still long, two-person, hand powered, cross-cut saws around as well as axes and machetes. So, after checking to be sure no forestry officials were working the area, trees would be cut down, logs cut to length and then maneuvered into position on the homemade sawmill, sometimes employing elephants. The two man teams, maybe with some substitutes to provide rest breaks, would then go to work, sawing the lumber into usable sizes depending on the intended use.

Once the lumber was cut to size, it was stock piled at the saw mill. Now came the risky part of the process as the lumber had to be transported to the building site in the village or town. Waiting until nighttime darkness was full, the lumber would be carried to the building site and either hidden or quickly attached to the house. I suppose pickup trucks were used for transportation at times, but it was not uncommon for us to see people hand carrying piles of lumber on their shoulders as we returned home late at night.

If we as foreigners knew this was going on, I am sure the forestry officials knew as well. My impression

Raising the posts to support a new house in
Mae Sariang

is that law enforcement in Thailand was selective, inconsistent, subject to secretive agreements and governmental mood swings. Personally, we were involved in a number of building projects related to mission houses, student hostels, and irrigation projects. Generally, we were hiring builders or workers and they were the ones deciding how and where to get the lumber and building materials. But through them, we became aware of some of the risks involved. In some cases, illegal lumber was the only material available. In other cases, legal lumber might be available but it would have been much more expensive. As missionaries, we generally would oversee the spending of mission funds which were always meager. Was it more ethical to nurture the mission money or buy the substantially more expensive legal lumber? Local church members would always recommend the less expensive route.

In November of 1988, there were coastal storms in southern Thailand in areas where large scale logging had been going on. I remember reports of huge stockpiles of logs stacked at the top of a mountain cascading down the freshly cleared slopes below, picking up boulders and mud as it all sped in an uncontrolled wave down the mountainside. Whole villages were instantly buried killing untold hundreds. Here is a link to an article written at the time: https://www.upi.com/Archives/1988/11/24/Torrential-monsoon-rains-triggered-mudslides-and-floods-that-swept/5315596350800/

That disaster led to the outlawing of all lumbering operations nationwide, even government sanctioned projects. Maybe it was good for Thai forests as a whole but it also led to logging operations across the Salween River in Burma. At the time, that part of Burma was controlled by the Karen who needed funding for their de facto country of Kawthoolay. So, the Karen were happy to sell logs to Thailand. Living in Mae Sariang at the time, just 30 miles from Burma, we were amazed at the number of logging trucks we encountered along the roads to and from the border town of Mae Sam Laep. We’ll write more about that in future posts.