Country: Laos

Group: Kor/Akah/Koh

Date Finalized: 5/1/2020

Team: Vianney Mancilla (lead), Erika Walker, Colleen Clauss

The Akha are included in the Lao Sung or high mountain Lao (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). Beginning in 1975, the Laos government displaced many of the highland people to lowland settlements, in efforts toward “rural development, increasing access to services and decreasing shift to cultivation” (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). However, these improvements were not fulfilled for many of the highlanders. The resettlement increased mortality rates by 70 percent in some Lao Sung communities due to the lack of resources (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). Moreover, the programs were criticized for ‘Laoiticizing’ indigenous groups or encouraging their assimilation (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). The resettlement program prevented the Lao Sung from exercising their right to their land and livelihood (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). More specifically, the Akha suffered from diseases, access to healthcare, high rates of opium addiction, and lack of government assistance (Cohen, 2000). As a result, the Akha have “become an impoverished labor force, exploited for the benefit of the politically and economically dominant Tai lowlanders” (Cohen, 2000). In the 1990s, the relocation was also motivated by the eradication of opium production which was supported by the UN Office for Drugs and Crime, the United States, and the European Union (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). The Akha were one of the main growers of opium; their loss of livelihood was not addressed in the resettlement and contributed to their impoverished conditions in the lowlands (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). The eradication of opium is utilized to justify the displacement of the highlanders-which led to their loss of land, livelihood, and poor living conditions (“Lao Sung”, n.d.). The data quality would be a 3, given the consistency among sources and mention of the United Nations, the United States, and the European Union involvement.

Sources

  1. Cohen, P. (2000). Resettlement, Opium and Labour Dependence: Akha-Tai Relations in Northern Laos. Development and Change, 31(1), 179-200. doi:10.1111/1467-7660.00151
  2. Minority Rights Group (n.d.). Lao Sung. Retrieved from https://minorityrights.org/minorities/lao-sung/