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In an August 23, 2007 Asia Times article, freelance journalist Clifford McCoy lifts the lid on the Burmese junta's hybrid rice-for-opium crop-substitution program in the northern part of Shan state ("Seedlings of evil growing in Myanmar"). Working from research conducted by Burmese researcher Hkun Seng, McCoy writes that four consecutive years of poor harvests with Chinese hybrid rice varieties have driven many ethnic-minority farmers into heavy debt or out of rice farming altogether. Meanwhile the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), Chinese business people and ethnic ceasefire and militia group leaders are all making large profits on the controversial project through the buying and selling of hybrid rice seeds, fertilizers, pesticides and the rice itself.

According to McCoy, Chinese hybrid rice, known locally as sinn shweli*, was introduced into northern Shan state in 2002 by Major-General Myint Hlaing, who was then commander of the SPDC's Northeast Command and military governor of the area. It's the centerpiece of the SPDC's so-called "New Destiny" project, a 15-year anti-narcotics campaign launched in April 2002 and overseen by the ruling junta's Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control.

He says that Official Agriculture Ministry statistics from this March show that sinn shweli rice accounts for 80,940 of the 197,800 hectares of rice currently under cultivation in northern Shan state. Apparently, the initial deal for the hybrid rice seeds was brokered by leaders of the Kokang Chinese Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, which controls territory along the Chinese border in northern Shan state. The rebel army agreed to a ceasefire with the Myanmar junta in 1989 and declared a ban on opium cultivation in its areas in 2003. The UWSA, the other major ceasefire group in the area, banned opium cultivation in 2005.

The programme's been a disaster for local farmers, who have no choice but to participate in the programme, whether they've been growing opium or not. According to McCoy, each crop since 2002 has failed. Plus, while the government claims that it subsidizes hybrid rice production, in practice the subsidies don't meet half the costs of the seeds, pesticides and fertlizers that farmers have to use. As a result, "after successive bad harvests and lacking the funds to service their debts, many farmers have been forced to sell their land, in many instances to the same Chinese business people who sold them the seeds, fertilizers and pesticides. On other occasions land is simply confiscated by militia groups or local business people working in cahoots with the SPDC to create large commercial farms."

The research by Seng also uncovers that there have been no government programs to properly train the farmers on hybrid rice production. McCoy notes that the Lashio Township government put out a pamphlet on how to grow the rice - but only in English, with the instructions for the fertilizers and pesticides only in Chinese, unreadable to most in Shan state. McCoy says that most farmers told him that they spray six kinds of pesticides at least six times within 120 days and farmers have reportedly become ill, with a few reported to have died after improperly using pesticides.

According to one SPDC official from the Agriculture Ministry in northern Shan state quoted by Seng: "Sinn shweli seeds need a lot of water and fertilizers, otherwise a low quantity of rice is produced. Shan state has little flat land and there is often not enough water to grow sinn shweli rice. In the view of agriculture officers, sinn shweli rice is not suitable for northern Shan state, but we have to pursue the policy and follow the orders of our superiors."

McCoy says that almost all of the rice under the programme is slated for export to China through the special economic zone at Muse, just across the Myanmar border from the Chinese town of Ruili. He says that Chinese traders are involved in every step of the production of sinn shweli rice, and that "they are also the main buyers, invariably owning the trucks and distribution companies that sell the rice to traders inside China." Plus, "farmers who cannot afford to pay off their debts incurred from the now higher costs of growing sinn shweli rice often end up selling their land to the same Chinese companies that sell the farming inputs. The companies then frequently turn the land into commercial rice farms. The overt and exploitative involvement of Chinese traders and the growing loss of land to Chinese business people is stoking anti-Chinese friction among certain ethnic-minority groups."

McCoy writes:

"SPDC officials and army officers in northern Shan state are also getting their cut from the transactions. The new commander of the Northeast Command, Major-General Aung Than Htun, who acts as the military governor of northern Shan state, is charged with issuing business permits to Chinese companies involved in the importation of seeds, fertilizers, pesticides and farming machinery, as well as for companies involved in commercial farming and the export of rice to China.

"Chinese companies also reportedly "donate" 2 hectares of land to the military or government departments when they purchase land from indebted local farmers. The army and the local government then use the acquired land to grow their own crops of sinn shweli rice, which is then sold back to the Chinese merchants.

"All in all, it's a state-sanctioned scheme that in the name of curbing opium cultivation is simultaneously making the region's already impoverished ethnic-minority groups even poorer and accelerating Chinese economic control over Myanmar's increasingly Sinified northern territories.

"The off-kilter economics of the trade are paving the way for Chinese traders to acquire huge swaths of previously ethnic-minority-owned land and simultaneously stoking anti-Chinese sentiment in Myanmar's far-flung northern regions."

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*Sinn shweli is the generic name given to hybrid rice seeds imported mainly from China's Yunnan and Sichuan provinces and covers a variety of strains, including Kangyou-827, -26, -151, -881, -803, -361, II-you-718, -838 and Dieyou-527.

Burma: Seedlings of evil