Reader question: What does three quarters of rai eucalyptus yield in Thailand?

Hello Peter,

My name is Daniel Jongejan, I work as Asia-Pacific Coordinator for Pur Projet, a French company specialized in facilitating projects in reforestation and conservation of ecosystems, through agroforestry, in currently more than 40 countries (www.purprojet .com). We currently have a large-scale forestation project in Thailand that we want to credit for VCS (Gold Standard – Forestry) in the long term. We work in the administrative provinces of Chiangmai, Chang Rai, Yasothon, Surin, Buriram, Sisaket and from 2016 also in Nan, which has been severely affected by deforestation by the agricultural sector. I received your question from my Belgian friend.

Especially in Isaan we are working on the rehabilitation of the original tree species. As you may know, the Eucalyptus trees were widely promoted by the Thai government in the 80s, hoping for a large return on investment. Unfortunately, after a number of years it turned out to be the reverse truth; the hoped-for sales never materialized and the Eucalyptus tree as a potential source of income was abandoned by the farmers (and maintenance was hardly done, so the tree spread rapidly). Eucalyptus is a tree species that originally comes from Australia and has the capacity to extract the water from the different layers of the ground and store it in its trunk. In Isaan it has been found that this has a fatal effect on the cultivation of any other type of crop and in 2015 we see that the quality of the soil is heavily degraded.

The company that promoted the Eucalyptus trees at the time is called Double A Paper Company. In Yasothon they still have a big presence, you could try selling your trees with them. However, my advice, as an ecologist, is to remove the tree with roots and off your soil and plant native (less invasive) species. You will see that in the long term the soil around your farm turns into sand, when you dig there is hardly any water in the soil, which means that all nutrients needed for other crops disappear (only shortening the tree to just above the ground is not enough, as the tree has an invasive character it will grow up again several times). I wish you every success with the removal of the Eucalytus, it is an expensive investment to remove the tree, but it will certainly benefit you in the long term.

Gr. Daniel Young Jan