She spends so much time immersed in water that she may soon turn into a mermaid. But Jariya Sakayaroj looks like she does not mind even if she ends up developing scales.

Microbiologist Jariya Sakayaroj explores the waters for fungi that may contain bioactive compounds that could be used for medical treatments. Credit: Nantiya Tangwisutijit/IPS

A microbiologist with the Bioresources Technology Unit of the National Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (BIOTEC), Jariya knows that the hours she spends wading through Thailand’s coastal areas may result in discoveries that could one day help battle illnesses like heart disease, cancer, or osteoporosis.

Jariya trawls the waters for fungi that may harbour bioactive compounds that could be used for medical treatments. She says that the unique ecology of mangroves, with their brackish water rising and falling twice daily, represents a particularly hostile environment for fungi, making their resilience especially attractive to pharmaceutical companies.

She warns, though: “We will never know which ones we might be losing as the seas warm and storm patterns shift, (taking) the benefits along with them. Yes, there are big changes taking place out there that we need to address, but the microscopic ones need attention too.”

Indeed, while much of the world now considers the declining ice habitat of polar bears as the main harbinger of ecological losses from advancing climate change, Thai scientists have been working in relative obscurity as they race against time to document microspecies in aquatic ecosystems.

Jariya says microorganisms represent one of the largest segments of the planet’s biological inventory. But she says that only about 10 percent of the world’s estimated 1.5 million microorganisms have been identified so far, and she fears that many may be disappearing before their compounds are known.

“Thailand is critical because about 10 percent of the world’s microorganisms and fungi can be found in here,” she says.

Of the 549 high marine fungi species known to exist in the world, 180 are found in this South-east Asian country. Forty of these are new species that Jariya’s marine fungi unit has discovered over the past decade. More than 60 years ago, penicillin introduced the world to fungi’s value to medicine. But it has only been during the past 15 years that researchers have been more aggressive in combing the planet for new fungi and bacteria that can advance medical treatments.

So far, 15 BIOTEC researchers probing marine, fresh water and forest ecosystems have identified 2,500 new microorganisms and 70 new bioactive compounds with new biochemical structures. These are now in the laboratories of the Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis, where they are undergoing further screening to identify substances that may be effective in treating diseases.

Novartis came to Thailand in 2005 to partner with Jariya and other BIOTEC researchers in the quest for new microorganisms from which natural compounds to use in medicines might be found. According to BIOTEC about 20 percent of the microorganisms now being studied by Novartis come from Thailand.

This is a development that has some Thai experts wary, however. For instance, pharmacologist and herbal medicine expert Supaporn Pitiporn of the Abhaibhubejhr Hospital in the eastern province of Prachin Buri points out that while Jariya’s work is critical, Thailand must keep close tabs on the bioactive compounds discovered within its borders.

“The benefits of fungi in particular are invaluable, used in many traditional healings, including detoxification, and as nutrient supplements,” says Supaporn, who turned her hospital’s herbal products into national best- selling healthcare products.

“However,” she says, “the government has been a pretty poor protector of the intellectual property rights, and we’re seeing these treatments being stolen, marketed, and generating profit for mainstream pharmaceutical interest.”

Traditional Thai healers acknowledge the efficacy of microorganisms in mushrooms to treat several diseases. The Reishi mushroom, for example, is used to delay tumour growth, as well as to stimulate the immune system. The Boletus mushroom, meanwhile, is recommended for those with tuberculosis.

Proteolytic bacteria from Thai traditional fermented foodstuff have also been found to have allergenic reducing potentials to wheat and milk allergens.

Yet while the potential loss of intellectual rights over Thailand’s microorganisms is worrisome, Thai researchers also say that it is equally important that people realise that even the tiniest of species can be a player in climate change mitigation.

Microorganisms like algae are already being scrutinised as potential sources for sustainable energy, while even the dangerous E. coli bacteria that cause most cases of food poisoning may soon be transformed into biological factories to make biofuels.

“We’re just now beginning to really explore what microorganism can offer us,” says Supaporn, “so efforts to protect the ecosystems to sustain them are becoming increasingly important.”

Also critical, observes Visut Baimai, head of the Biodiversity Research and Training Programme, is the role species monitoring plays in helping Thailand to better understand the direction climate change is taking.

Says the biologist: “While so many resources are invested in sophisticated climate models, observations of plant and animal responses to the rise in the ambient temperatures of their habitats can tell us a lot.”

That includes the tracking of microorganisms. According to Visut, the further documentation of species big and small could only help accelerate public support for more aggressive climate change policies.

“Thai people are more concerned with animals than they are graphs and charts,” he says. “For better or worse, they need to see these kinds of impact before they will feel compelled to act.”

* This story is part of a series of features on biodiversity by IPS, CGIAR/Bioversity International, IFEJ and UNEP/CBD, members of Communicators for Sustainable Development (http://www.complusalliance.org).

The view from Bhorn’s window in this northern province is as picturesque as one can find in rural Thailand. The Nan River flows majestically through the Gulf of Thailand, located 300 kilometres to the south. Mango and banana trees line the banks with expansive verdant green paddy fields beyond.

Unfortunately, for the past four years, Bhorn and her neighbours have not been able to enjoy these breathtaking sights, forced to tightly board up all openings to seal their homes and families from ash they believe is causing their skin and respiratory disorders.

Less than a kilometre from their houses, Bhorn says, sits the source of their problem. It is Thailand’s most celebrated renewable energy plant.

The 22-megawatt rice husk-fueled power plant owned by A.T. Biopower is the country’s first to be certified under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) for carbon trading — one of the means industrialised nations can meet their obligations under the international agreement to reduce carbon emissions. According to the protocol, projects under the CDM are required to bring social and environmental benefits to host communities.

That is assuming that the company exercises extreme caution to ensure that its power plant does not pose any harm to the community’s health. Rice husks, after all, contain silica, which is known to cause silicosis, the world’s most common occupational lung disease among unprotected workers. Silica concentrations in rice husk ash can range from 85 to 90 percent.

A.T. Biopower is just one of many small power plants to come on line in the past decade as Thailand heeds the global call to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels — the main source of greenhouse gas emissions that drive climate change.

The country’s current goal is to generate 20 percent of the nation’s electricity from renewable sources by 2022, a target similar to those set by the European Union, Britain and Australia.

Bhorn, who declined to give her full name, says she is unfamiliar with new energy polices but has become increasingly aware of environmental changes obtaining in her community since the A.T. Biopower plant began to operate there in 2005.

The 51-year-old farmer complained of reduction in her rice yields that began immediately after the power plant became operational and a nearly invisible layer of ash started to descend on her fields.

“While my harvest has nearly returned to normal, health problems from the dust have persisted. Residents, especially children, have developed skin rashes and breathing difficulties, which is why we’ve closed up our windows and doors,” Bhorn explains.

Bhorn’s community is not alone in this predicament. Supakij Nantaworakarn, a renewable energy researcher with the non-government Healthy Public Policy Foundation says that protests against biomass projects have been widespread in at least 20 Thai provinces, many of which are ongoing.

Biomass from agricultural waste can be converted to electricity, fuel and heat. As an energy source, it is considered clean and renewable.

“Renewable energy, notably the readily available biomass, is good for Thailand, but the government has to ensure investors carry out their projects responsibly,” Supakij says. He explains that “investors consistently build 9.9-megawatt plants to avoid the environmental impact assessment (EIA) required by law for any power plant exceeding 10 megawatts in capacity.”

Yet completing an EIA does not guarantee no problems will arise in the future. Once approved, plants operate with little government oversight, he says.

A.T. Biopower’s chief executive officer, Natee Sithiprasasana, says he is not aware of health problems arising from his company’s plant operations. He adds that the company maintains an environment and health insurance fund earmarked for the community.

The company’s website says that an environmental guarantee fund of five million baht has been set aside, which the fund committee will release to the “affected parties” in case “the power plant causes any damage to the community.”

But Bhorn is unaware of this fund.

“Even if the fund exists, I don’t think it’s accessible to us. We are just poor villagers. We have no means to prove that our health problem comes from the dust. I once asked a doctor [about it], but he says it’s difficult to make the link,” she says.

But Dr Somkiat Siriratanapruk, deputy director of the Public Health Ministry’s Bureau of Occupational and Environmental Disease, says it is possible to establish the link. Villagers simply have to file complaints with his office, which will then measure airborne silica concentrations in and take an X-ray of the villagers’ lungs to determine if their respiratory symptoms are consistent with silicosis.

Natee says his company has invested in expensive U.S. incineration technology as proof of its social and environmental commitment. Based on the company’ website, it employs “complete combustion technique and any particulates from the combustion will go through electrostatic precipitator, which catches 99.53 percent of dust, before being released from the plant.”

Still, residents question the firm that in 2006 was recognised by the Ministry of Energy for “Excellence in Environment and Community Management”. In 2003, many Hor Krai residents expressed grave concern about the potential impacts of A.T. Biopower’s plant on their community.

One shop house owner, for instance, recounts how a protest was launched when they first heard about the project. The movement disbanded quickly, he notes. Leaders gave up and “disappeared,” he says. “I don’t really know why they abandoned the fight.”

The answer lay 50 km away in Nakhon Sawan’s Tambon Nam Song, where A.T. Biopower planned to build another rice husk-fired power plant. Suraphol Pan-ngam, spokesman for the anti-power plant Nam Song Conservation Club, recalls being contacted by one of the ex-protest leaders from Hor Krai, asking if some “compensation” might encourage him to give up his opposition to the power plant.

“We knew right away that people involved in the project wanted to buy us off, making the power plant look even more dishonest and disgusting to us,” Suraphol says. The Nam Song protests persisted, prompting A.T. Biopower to ultimately withdraw its project application in October 2007.

Difficulties spawned by his community’s seven-year struggle have made Suraphol keenly aware of other communities struggling to cope with the hazards posed by similar projects.

One of these is Khamsangsai community in Ubon Rachathani province, where hundreds of village folk are protesting a 9.9-megawatt rice husk-fueled power plant that Bua Sommai Co., Ltd. plans to build in the center of their community, since they were deeply concerned about the facility’s potential effects on their health and environment.

Health activist and community resident Sodsai Srangsoke says that on hearing about the company’s plans last year, she began to research Bua Sommai and found that it operated one of the Northeast’s largest rice mills in the province of Roi Et and held a small share in the adjacent 9.8-megawatt Roi Et Green rice husk power plant. The company has two more new power plants, also fuelled by rice husk, under construction in the same province.

Together with fellow villagers, she headed to Roi Et city last year to inquire from the people living around Bua Sommai’s facilities about their living conditions.

Residents in just about every house showed them the rice husk ash on their furniture and floors, a problem the Khamsangsai visitors were told had been going on for many years. Many residents complained of breathing difficulties, which they were convinced came from Bua Sommai’s rice mill and power plant.

Roi Et provincial industry officer Prayoon Jirajetsadaporn was reported to have been presented with these concerns many times and promised to look into the complaints. Yet the problem remains to this day. Bua Sommai’s general manager Piraporn Somsup told the villagers that the company would only provide medical help to the affected individuals if doctors certified that their health problems arose from the company’s rice mill.

To date, the villagers have not seen any tangible solution to their problem except to hear Piraporn’s hollow assurances that the “company has invested heavily in dust-capturing technology from India” for the new biomass plants presently under construction.

*This story is part of a series of features on sustainable development by IPS – Inter Press Service and IFEJ – International Federation of Environmental Journalists, for the Alliance of Communicators for Sustainable Development ( www.complusalliance.org).