Living over Water - Restorative Redevelopment of Devastated Ecocultural Landscapes - page 243

FIGURE 14.16 Fishes shown on the temple carvings are still caught by locals using the

same methods.

which most sewage is still not treated, it is inescapable to reach the conclusion that
the absence of regulation of development is due to the well-known and widespread
governmental corruption. Questions about carrying capacity, an important step in
watershed development planning (France 2006), seem (if asked at all) to be con-
veniently ignored. In the meantime, rampant high-end tourism continues with the
construction of luxury hotels, tacky theme parks (Figure 14.17), and ostentatious golf
course resorts. One fears that the arrival of the casinos and the Las Vegas-ization of
Siem Reap may only be just around the corner.
And there may be more serious threats on the horizon. The recent discovery of
extensive offshore oil reserves will transform Cambodia (Mcleod 2006). Most of the
revenue is expected to go to one of the world's most corrupt governments and help
to create a select wealthy upper class (i.e., the “oil curse” paradox, where a mas-
sive influx of oil money causes economic stagnation and increased poverty, as in
Nigeria). And it is these people who will become increasingly involved in developing
Siem Reap as their history-nature-pleasure park. The situation looks bleak given
that oil reserves have also been found around the Tonle Sap itself.
All this pales, however, in relation to what is in the works upstream. Just as the
long-term future of the Iraqi marshlands is in the hands of the water managers in
Turkey, so too does the ultimate survival of the Tonle Sap lie with China's hydroen-
gineers. Plans exist for a series of hydroelectrical dams on Mekong River which
would reduce the high-water floods and thus impact fish migration and production
(Bailleux 2003; Varis, Kummu, and Keskinen 2006). It is feared that China, with its
long history of meddling in Southeast Asia, can bribe the Cambodian government to
turn a blind eye to the projected widespread environmental and sociological rami-
fications of altering the hydrological regime of the Tonle Sap. In contrast, Turkey,
given its desire for future EU membership, might be able to be strong-armed into