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Internal Migration and Regional Development: The Khon Kaen Development Centre of Northeast Thailand*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2011

Larry Sternstein
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Extract

When Khon Kaen town was designated the development centre for Northeast Thailand in 1962 it was a small provincial capital, undistinguished save for being the most centrally located on-rail town in the region. (See Figure 1.) Khon Kaen has since been transformed. Several tens of government agencies concerned with development in the Northeast now have regional or sub-regional offices in or near Khon Kaen. A regional technical school and the University of the Northeast have been established. A network of paved roads, a spacious, modern bus terminal and a newly constructed airfield, in addition to a renovated railway, have made Khon Kaen a major transportation hub, readily accessible to northeasterners and indeed to all of Thailand. Khon Kaen was the first provincial centre to have a town plan. Although this plan, designed to make Khon Kaen a showpiece of modern urban development, has not been carried out in toto, urban facilities have been greatly improved and expanded, and commercial activity has diversified and burgeoned. The population of Khon Kaen town increased more than fifty percent in the period 1960–1970.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , March 1977 , pp. 106 - 116
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1977

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References

1 See The National Economic Development Plan 1961–1966 (The National Economic Development Board, Office of the Prime Minister, Government of Thailand, Bangkok 1961Google Scholar).

2 See Plan of Province Khon Kaen 1982 (Department of Town and Country Planning, Ministry of Interior, Government of Thailand. Bangkok. September 1962)Google Scholar.

3 See Thomas, M. L. and Noranitipadungkarn, C., with the assistance of Krannich, R., Administrative Capacity of Urban Centers in Northeast Thailand to Handle an Influx of Pa Mong Evacuees: Khon Kaen, A Case Study (Dekalb, Illinois and Bangkok, Thailand, May 1972Google Scholar); and Krannich, L., “The Construction Firm as a Middleman: Toward a Conceptual Category of Thai Urban Development”,Urbanization in Thailand, Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Occasional Papers, Number 2, Center for Governmental Studies (Northern Illinois University, 1974).Google Scholar

4 See The Third National Economic and Social Development Plan (1972–1976) (National Economic and Social Development Board, Office of the Prime Minister, Government of Thailand, Bangkok 1971Google Scholar).

5 For a critique of this proposal see Sternstein, L., “Urban problems and solutions according to the Thai experts”, Seminar on Australian aid to Thailand, 12–13 July 1975 (Development Studies Centre, The Australian National University).

6 See Pakkasem, P., “Thailand Country Report”, Urban Development Strategies for Attaining Desirable Population Distribution in the Context of Regional Development, Senior-Level Seminar, U.N. Centre for Regional Development, Nagoya, Japan, 28 October to 8 November 1974Google Scholar; and Friedmann, J., Specific Recommendations on Regional Planning in the Rural-Urban Context in Thailand (National Economic and Social Development Board, Bangkok, March 1975).Google Scholar