Summary:
Since 2007, destructive platinum mining has been taking place in the hills north of
Tachilek, eastern Shan State, impacting about 2,000 people from eight Lahu, Akha
and Shan villages. The platinum is being extracted by Burmese mining companies and
exported to China and Thailand.
Five companies are currently operating around the Akha village of Ah Yeh, 13 kilometers
north of Tachilek. They have forced villagers to sell property and land at cheap prices,
and confiscated other lands without compensation. Hundreds of acres of farms and

... Since ceasefire agreements were signed between the Burmese military government and ethnic political groups in the Burma–China borderlands in the early 1990s, violent waves of counterinsurgency development have replaced warfare to target politically-suspect, resource-rich, ethnic populated borderlands. The Burmese regime allocates land concessions in ceasefire zones as an explicit postwar military strategy to govern land and populations to produce regulated, legible, militarized territory. Tracing the relationship of military–state formation, land control

Farmers from Ayeyarwady Region have established an association to strengthen their land use rights and improve technical knowledge.

The Farmer Development Association is based on more than 50 village-level groups, ranging in size from five to more than 30 members, formed recently in Bogale, Kyaiklat and Mawlamyinegyun townships...

Since a new quasi-parliamentary government led by former army officers began work in Burma (Myanmar) earlier this year, some observers have argued that the government is showing a commitment to bring about, albeit cautiously, reforms that will result in an overall improvement in human rights conditions.

Khin Shwe, the chairman of Zay Kabar Company and a member of Burma’s Lower House, will face a lawsuit filed by farmers from Rangoon’s Mingaladon Township whose farmland he allegedly confiscated.

The farmers were previously allowed to continue growing paddy and other crops even after their lands were seized, but they are no longer permitted to do so. Many have been threatened and told to vacate the land, that’s why they are preparing to sue him, said Kyaw Sein, a farmer who lost 50 acres of land...

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While Burma’s ethnic states are blessed with a wealth of natural resources and biodiversity, they
have been cursed by the unsustainable extraction and sale of those resources, which has fuelled
armed conflict. Instituting a system of devolved federal management of natural resources can
play a key role in resolving conflict and building a lasting peace in Burma.
Despite some ceasefires on paper, Burma remains in a state of conflict. Ongoing offensives in
Kachin and Shan states alone have left hundreds of thousands homeless. Fundamental calls for

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is concerned by the case of a group of farmers who lodged a complaint about attempts of an army-owned company and the powerful Htoo Company to acquire their land at a greatly undervalued amount. The farmers' complaint was rejected in court on grounds that the land was being acquired for a government project, even though the company is private. After, the company and army officers involved organized for a gang to ambush and attack a group of the farmers and to have a false criminal case lodged against them.

A VISITING land expert has warned against falling for the “dominant model” of land grabbing, which sees small-scale farmers replaced by agri-businesses that are in many cases less productive.

Mr Robin Palmer, who has worked on land issues for more than 35 years as both an academic and for British NGO Oxfam, said last week that population pressures and the increasing consumption of meat and dairy products in developing countries were often used to justify plantation farming, with peasant farmers and traditional pastoralists dismissed as “romantic nonsense”.

... This piece of community initiated action research reveals a number of lessons we can learn. The authors try to reflect the challenges of and opportunities for community based natural resources management in a seemingly forgotten Karen controlled area of southern Myanmar. The paper examines a number of case studies including the construction of a local water supply system, the establishment of fish conservation zones and community-driven forest conservation.

... Extremely rapid growth in Chinese imports of ‘redwood’, ‘rosewoods’ or ‘Hongmu’ timbers from Myanmar in the past two years is directly driving increased illegal and unsustainable logging, posing a real threat to governance, the rule of law and the viability Myanmar’s dwindling forests. EIA research shows that, based on current trends, the two most targeted Hongmu species in
Myanmar - tamalan and padauk - could be logged to commercial extinction in as little as three years.

Much has been made in recent times of the continued use in Burma of antiquated and anti-human rights laws from the country's decades of military rule, as well as from the colonial era. While legislators discuss the amendment or revocation of some laws, and the issue is debated in the public domain, much less is said of the superstructure of military-introduced administrative orders that officials around the country continue to employ in their day-to-day activities, invariably in order to circumscribe or deny human rights.