Climate Change and Migration

On Sunday 17th of March Jess and I headed off to Bangkok again, this time for a consultation meeting on MMN’s project on Climate Change and Migration. This is a project that Jessica has been coordinating in cooperation with research teams in Vietnam and Burma/Myanmar. The primary research for the project took place In November 2012, in Ma Gyi Chay Htaut Village, Magway Region, in Myanmar’s ‘Dry Zone’, and in Thanh An Commune, Vinh Thanh District, Can Tho City, in the Mekong Delta region of Southern Vietnam. The purpose of the consultation meeting in Bangkok was to present the findings of the case studies; re-visit the links between Climate Change and Migration; compare with the findings of the case studies; identify key issues and concerns including policy gaps; identify recommended themes for further research; and identify possible advocacy points. 

The meeting was held in the same hotel as the Symposium, but this time around it was a much smaller group. We had three participants from Vietnam and one from Burma, as well as representatives from MMN secretariat. All in all we were 8 people which enabled insightful discussions, where everyone could have their say. The meeting was only two days long, but the days were packed with presentations, discussions and group activities. Climate Change and Migration is a topic that I previously was not very familiar with. This consultation meeting was therefore a great opportunity for me to learn more about the issue. I found the meeting very interesting, especially the findings from the primary research. Climate Change and Migration in the research areas is closely linked to issues of inequality, wealth distribution and power. Climate change has the most severe effects on the poorest and most disadvantaged people and their prospects of migrating are in most cases completely different to those who are better off. The finalised report will be launched in early June, so I am very interested in reading it and seeing the conclusions coming out of the meeting. The Report will be published on MMN’s website (mekongmigration.org). 

One of my responsibilities for this meeting was to be in charge of the reimbursements and payments to the participants. I also gave a quick recap of the day one in the morning session of the second day. I was very nervous, but the meeting was small and all the participants were incredibly friendly, so the recap was ok.

My second stay in Bangkok was therefore not as large and long as the last one, but it was nevertheless a great experience. The fact that the meeting group was so small made the dynamic of the meeting completely different to the Symposium in February. Both meetings have taught me so much, not only about the respective thematic areas but also about the organising of large and small civil society events.  

Ms. Huynh Thi Ngoc Tuyet from Center for Research and Consultancy for Development, Vietnam

Ms. Jessica Marsh and Ms. Huynh Thi Ngoc Tuyet

Dr. Tran Thanh Be from the Can Tho Institute of Socio-Economic Development Studies (CIDS)

Group Activity

Mr. Nguyen Quoc Dinh from Center for Research and Consultancy for Development, Vietnam and Dr. Tran Thanh Be

Mr. Kyan Dyne Aung from Ecodev, Myanmar and Ms. Reiko Harima, MMN Regional Coordinator

Group Activity

Ms. Jesica Marsh

Mr. Kyan Dyne Aung

  Mr. Nguyen Quoc Dinh

Ms. Huynh Thi Ngoc Tuyet

Dr. Tran Thanh Be

Me, giving a recap of the first day

Ms. Pranom Somwong, MMN Advocacy Convener

International Women’s Day and “Can Do” bar

The past couple of weeks have flown by. After the Symposium in Bangkok I was busy working on the donor report for Toyota Foundation. Writing the donor report was very useful, as I had to go through all of the documents, Power Points and minutes from the Symposium, giving me a great overview and recap of the week-long event.  I also believe that this experience is useful for future work and involvement with donors. 

One of the most exciting events after coming back from Bangkok was the International Women’s Day. After work Jess, Plaii and I rushed off to join MAP Foundation and The Women Exchange marching through town. We all had pink t-shirts, singing “women, women, rise up, rise up” (to the melody of We Will Rock You) in English, Thai and Burmese. My friends Hulda and Espen also joined us; Espen being one of the very few men in the march. I have not marched on International Women’s Day in many years, so it was such a great experience seeing so many women rising up together, having fun and taking over the streets in Chiang Mai. The marching women (and men) ended up outside Tha Pae Gate where people gave speeches, showed dance routines, sang and had fun.  This was by far the most unique March 8 I have ever experienced.

The week following International Women’s day was also very busy, with lots of things to do both at work and after work. I continued working on the donor report and before sending it off, my colleague Jess had a look through, edited it and gave me tips and advice on how to make the language of the report much more direct, conveying the same information in a much clearer way. One of the greatest parts of my stay here has  been the fact that I keep learning so much from my wonderful colleagues,  about migration; about Thailand; about other Mekong countries; Chiang Mai and more. 

Jess, who is on an Australian volunteer program, has a lot of friends from the same program based in Chiang Mai. So in the week after International Women’s day she brought me to several dinners with all the other Australian volunteers. We went to some lovely restaurants and some great bars. One of the bars we went to is run by one of MMN’s member organisations, Empower, working with sex workers in Chiang Mai. “Can Do” bar is owned and managed by a group of sex workers from Empower and it all began in 2006 when the founders decided to create a bar owned by sex workers for sex workers. Any sex worker who contributes to the community fund at “Can Do” bar becomes part of the collective ownership. I really enjoyed the bar and I got a little tour around the building where they also have a drop in centre, classroom and lounge for sex workers. I find Empower’s work very interesting and I would recommend people to have a look into their work. 

On the weekend we also visited a bar called Gossip bar in the centre of the Old City. Gossip is a great little Jazz bar, with jam sessions on Friday nights. One of Jess’ friends got up and played the trombone along with loads of local musicians. So the past couple of weeks have been very busy, with lots of fun things happening. My next post will be about our second trip to Bangkok for a consultation meeting on MMN’s project on Climate Change and Migration. 

All the women gathered before the march, pink t-shirts and traditional clothes

Mr. Jai Sak from MAP Foundation  handing out water

Hulda and Jess before the march

Hulda and Jess marching

Women with banners

Hulda and Espen (one of the few not wearing pink)

Phil and Julian in the march

All the ladies!

Hulda and Espen

Ms. Jackie Pollock, founder of MAP Foundation

Jess and me in Women Exchange T-shirts (Photo:  Jessica Marsh)

Me (Photo: Jessica Marsh)

 

The Symposium

After lots of preparations and a fair amount of stress Jess, Plaii, P Eid and I (Chiang Mai based secretariat) were off to Bangkok for the symposium. We left on Sunday the 25^th of February and arrived at hotel Ibis around five in the afternoon. The hotel was lovely, situated right by the river with a great pool and nice meeting room arrangements. On Sunday we only did a few preparations such as printing registration forms and making sure that everything was ready for the next day. On Monday, the whole day consisted of internal MMN meetings discussing how the week would pan out and who was to do what. One of my main tasks was to take pictures during the symposium, for later documentation. I was also placed at the registration desk every morning, making sure that the participants signed in, that they received the symposium packs and whatever information they needed. 

The title of the symposium was “Mekong Symposium on Migration Migrants from the Mekong Neighbourhood Living Together Seeking Effective Responses to Enable Integration and Social Cohesion.” So the theme was about migrants and local people living together rather than alongside each other. The Mekong Migration Network brought together 72 representatives of governments, academic institutions, INGOs, NGOs and migrant groups from Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar/Burma, Thailand, Vietnam and Yunnan province of China, to share their perspectives on how migrants and host communities can live together. The purpose of the symposium was for the participants to jointly developed strategies and recommendations to enhance social cohesion in the Mekong region and enable migrant and host communities to live together peacefully and in harmony.

Seeing as I was taking most of the photos I got to sit in on all the plenaries and see most of the resource persons speak. Even though discussion among governments and civil society concerning labour migration has increased, there is still a lack of discussion about social cohesion and living together in the Mekong, and more broadly in ASEAN. It was therefore incredibly insightful to hear people from such different backgrounds, talk and discuss about living together in the Mekong.  Some of the speakers were Ms. Jackie Pollock from MAP Foundation; Ms. Puja Kapai, associate professor from the University of Hong Kong; Mr. Precha Soravisute from the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security, Royal Government of Thailand; Mr. Luca Pierantoni from the Delegation of the European Union to Thailand; H.E. U Myint Thein, the Deputy Minister from the Ministry of Labour, Government of Republic of the Union of Myanmar; H.E. Ms. Chou Bun Eng, Secretary of State, Ministry of Interior, Royal Government of Cambodia and Mr Jai Sak, migrants representative. 

It was also very interesting to see from the inside how such an event is organised, how it works and what comes out of it. At the end of the Symposium there was a press conference where the outcome and recommendations developed during the three day event were presented. The recommendations were many, targeted at community, national and regional actors, so the presence of media, government officials, and lots of civil society organisations was therefore key when adopting and presenting the recommendations.

So it is safe to say that the week in Bangkok has taught me so much and given me and experience I will never forget. Because MMN is a small organisation they do not have the opportunity to host such events very often, the timing of my placement with MMN has therefore been perfect. In the week to come I will be working on the donor report for the Symposium, which I am very excited for.

H. E. Ms. Chou Bun Eng

H. E. Ms. Chou Bun Eng

Symposium Participants from Burma, with Mr. Precha Sorivasute  (second from the left)

Ms. Anna Olsen (ILO) and H.E. Ms. Chou Bun Eng

Mr Mom Sokchar and Mr. Michael Hewitt

Ms. Huynh Thi Ngoc Tuyet

The week was very intereting, but also tiering

Ms. Ninpaseuth Xayaphonesy From Lao Women's Union

Mr. Jai Sak, migrants representative

Mr. Mom Sokchar and Ms. Reiko Harima (MMN Regional Coordinator)

H. E. U Myint Thein, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Labour, Myanmar

Drinks reception after the press conference

The meeting room

The weeks leading up to the symposium

MMN is hosting a large symposium in Bangkok from the 26^th of February until the 28^th. In addition the secretariat (including me) will be attending several internal MMN meetings in the days leading up to, and the days afterthe symposium. We therefore have a lot of planning and organizing to do, so the people at my office have been quite busy. I have been working on some logistical preparations, such as making a directory of participants, a registration form, nametags and name plates. In addition I have been proofreading the new resource book that MMN is in the process of publishing; “Border Economic Zones”. This has been very exciting as the material is interesting and I have realised how many things need to be in place before publishing a book. However there were a lot of changes that neededto be done and we were all pressed for time, so the editing was handed over toone of my Thai colleagues who has more experience working with MMN and their publications, and could better communicate with the publisher. In the end the book was published just in time for the symposium. Last but not least we havehad to do a lot of other preparations such as packing up books and materialsthat we need to bring to Bangkok and print programs and other documents to handout to participants. 

The two weeks leading up to the Symposium have not only been busy at work, I have also had visitors from Norway staying with me. Three friends from back home (Daniel, Hulda and Espen) who are travelling around South East Asia at the moment came to stay with me in Chiang Mai for a while. The first couple of weeks have been quite slow socially, so itwas great to have some familiar faces around, to have a laugh and experience Chiang Mai in a different way. We walked around the Old City for quite a bit and went to see the Saturday Market which was overwhelmingly busy. In addition we went to a temple at the top of the mountain Doi Suthep, overlooking Chiang Mai. I can see this temple from my bedroom window and I have wanted to go there for a longtime, so we decided to go. The temple was wonderful however the view was hampered by thick smog, making it almost impossible to see the city below themountain. Due to pollution and the burning of crops in surrounding areas,Chiang Mai experiences such thick smog every year around this time.

We also went to Chiang Mai Zoo where we sawa hippopotamus, pandas, flamingos, white tigers, elephants and giraffes. Therewas also a huge aquarium, with sharks and turtles and all kinds of fish, whichwe really enjoyed. 

Aside from checking out some of Chiang Mai’s tourist attractions we also tried out several great restaurants and a lovely Jazz bar with where local musicians come and play every Tuesday.  My colleague Jess has showed me lots of places to go for amazing food, and I have taken a strong liking to Burmesefood. It is absolutely incredible. The food is quite different from what I amused to, but it is really tasty. Some people say that it is a mix between Thaiand Indian, which can’t really go wrong in my opinion. Jess has been in Chiang Mai for 10 months and knows the city very well, so she has been very good to me showingme great places to go for food and drink. I am also very lucky in the sensethat I live only five minutes away from the busy Suthep Road. Every evening around 5 or 6 pm loads of small food stalls pop up, selling a large variety of street food. I go there almost every day as the food is really cheap and really good. 

So the past few weeks have therefore been really nice, I have learnt a lot and experienced more of Chiang Mai. Hulda and Espen have gone off to work on a farm in Chiang Mai Province, and Daniel is moving onto Pai. Next stop for me is the Symposium in Bangkok!

My colleague P Eid in the office

My desk

Plaii and Jess working hard in the office

I bought myself a new bike

Plaii and Jess, having lunch at Pun Pun

Me in the office

Daniel having a foot massage in the Old City

 Statue in the Old City

Wall of orchids at the zoo

Espen and Daniel at the zoo

Flamingos

Hulda and Espen feeding the giraffs

Daniel at the aquarium

Espen and me at the Aquarium

Eating a variety of streetfood from Suthep Road, in my room