Hmong (Meo) Highlander Merchants in Lowland Thai Markets Spontaneous Development of Highland-Lowland Interactions

Abstract

Hmong (Meo) people comprise about 11 percent of the minority people in the Thai highlands, and are the most notorious opium producing group. Development activities among Hmong and other opium producers have focused on introduction of substi- tute cash crops and reforestation of Imperata grassland. Because opium is a cash crop they have incorrectly assumed that any crop with an equivalent cash yield can be readily substituted. They have ignored unique features of opium (low bulk, very high value, easy to store, transport and sell, direct utility as a medium of exchange to hire labourers). Planning has failed to allow for population growth and has generally ignored indigenous views of economic problems or spontaneous efforts to cope with them. This paper con- siders direct sales of crafts and forest and farm products in lowland markets as one spontaneous response, and also comments on the indigenous view of the role of education in development. Fifty Hmong merchants in Chiang Mai and two in Bangkok were interviewed between March and September 1979. Slightly more than half were women; ages ranged from 10 to over 60. They are of two types, those who sell farm and forest products, and sellers of crafts. They generate substantial amounts of cash and contribute to the support of large numbers of family members. None of the produce they sell is related to crop substitution activities. No development efforts are directed at improving the efficiency of their operations. Hmong merchants are apparently pioneers in a process which is bringing increasing numbers of Hmong and other highlanders out of the mountains; some (especially craft sellers) because they see economic opportunity there, while others (sellers of produce such as kindling and bamboo shoots) because they cannot make a living in the mountains. Education, which is now becoming widespread in the highlands, is seen by Hmong craft sellers as important to commercial success in the lowlands, but is not seen by produce sellers as important for success in agriculture. Craft sellers, who require a capital investment in inventory, are more likely to come from households with good access to agricultural land than are produce sellers, who gather or produce their own products. Indigenous efforts at development, such as those of Hmong merchants should be taken into account in development planning, both because of the development activities themselves, and because of what these activities reveal about the willingness of these people to act as entrepreneurs and to innovate.