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The paper discusses forest habitat classification system used by the Pwo Karen in Thung Yai Naresuan Wildlife Sanctuary in western Thailand and the Non-Timber Forest Products (NTFPs) gathered in these habitats. The paper argues that the Pwo Karen have two methods of forest classification, and that these are closely related to their swidden farming practices. The first is used to classify forestland that has been, or can be, swiddened, and uses the age of the vegetation to essentially indicate if the forestland has been left fallow for sufficiently long and is now ready for farming again, or if it has been left fallow for too long, and the effort involved in clearing and burning the forest is now too high. The second system is used for land that is not suitable for cultivation, and looks at soil properties and slope. The paper then turns to the wild vegetables that the Karen gather from the various habitats, and which together account for some 80 to 90 percent of the vegetables they eat. The article describes the quantity of wild vegetables that the Karen gather during the year from each habitat, including the seasonal variation, and provides an estimate of the economic value of these wild vegetables, using comparable vegetables sold in the market as a proxy. The paper concludes that the amount of NTFPs available in each habitat has influenced the forestland management of the Karen, notably their choice to set their villages near the river, and not to cut the forest near their villages. Knowledge of the habitat of origin of NTFPs can have important implications for policy planning, especially when the government interferes in swiddening practices, thereby altering forest habitats.

シャフウィナさんは、北スマトラ沖大地震の後、アチェに行き、被災地を訪れて日本からの救援金を渡すと同時に、「立ち上がれアチェ」グループに入って、被災者とともに祈りをささげ、詩を読み、唄を歌う等の方法で、被災者を勇気ずけておられます。

講演には、写真や詩の朗読を含み、また日本語も交えて話されます。

大学以外からの広く一般よりのご参加も歓迎です。

To achieve the shared objective ? reconcile human development with environmental conservation -- individuals and organizations from Bolivia, Brazil, and Peru have worked together to establish a basis for sustainable development in southwestern Amazonia. This frontier region is called MAP for the first initials of the political units Madre de Dios-Peru, Acre-Brazil, and Pando-Bolivia. The name MAP also represents the summed activities of people from three countries working together for a common goal. In recent years, the MAP Region (300,000 km2, 700,000 human residents, and extraordinary biological and cultural diversity) has suffered accelerating changes, due primarily to an expanding network of all-weather highways to the Pacific. One of the first signs of these changes is the increasing use of natural resources ? timber and water ? and the substitution of forests by pastures and agricultural plots. The extraordinary cultural diversity of the MAP Region includes diverse traditional and Indigenous societies. The Indigenous peoples of the MAP Region share similar histories, similar perspectives of development and face similar problems of land tenure and cultural dissolution with the new road infrastructure. Environmental contamination caused by mining activities has already had major impacts on several native communities. Faced with these challenges, Indigenous organizations of the MAP Region have made joint declarations at the trinational level that facilitate comprehensive solutions. These declarations address territorial protection of Indigenous groups in voluntary isolation, bilingual education, as well as encouraging the use of native oral traditions as a means of strengthening their cultures. They have noted that outside advisors should only work for a limited time with Indigenous communities and help them attain administrative autonomy. Traditional societies, such as rubber tappers and riverbank dwellers, are also undergoing rapid changes brought on by the improving transportation network. All are faced with grave socio-economic problems in a region of abundant natural resources. The MAP process provides individuals and organizations -- such as Indigenous and traditional groups ? the opportunity to develop binational and trinational collaboration to find new paths to solve common regional problems. The MAP frontier social moviment realizes that only through the cooperation and interaction of various sectors of local, regional, national, and global societies will it be possible attain development of southwestern Amazonia that safeguards human dignity and diversity for the coming decades.

Malaysia has been one of the largest semiconductor exporters since the 1980s. Entering the new millennium, this industry is still dominated by semiconductor MNCs. However, some Malaysian companies have embarked on assembly and packaging of semiconductors. They are the sub-contractors for semiconductor MNCs. Since semiconductor is both knowledge-and technology-intensive product, the capabilities to provide sub-contracting services depend critically on intellectual capital. This study is the first to examine intellectual capital in Malaysian semiconductor companies. By conducting content analysis of the companies' annual reports, it was found that a substantial amount of intellectual capital existed in these companies. However, compared with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and Intel Corporation, Malaysian companies must further enhance their intellectual capital in order to climb up the technological ladder of the industry.