Elephants superseded by N.Z.-built road

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32588, 23 April 1971, Page 2

Elephants superseded by N.Z.-built road

(N.Z.P.A. Staff Correspondent)

MAHASARAKHAM (Thailand), April 22.

“Now we do not have to ride on an elephant any more—we can drive out of our town.” With these words the Governor of Buriram, a country town of 50,000 people in remote north-eastern Thailand, on Wednesday formally welcomed a new road built with New Zealand aid.

Governor Surawat was speaking to about 50 New Zealanders and Thais who had just arrived at Buriram in the first full-scale convoy to drive the length of the 90-mile road which is helping to open up one of Thailand’s most backward areas, about 300 miles north of Bangkok.

Among the visitors was the New Zealand Ambassador (Mr E. H. Halstead) who steered a giant earth-moving machine to mark ceremonially the completion of earthworks. “We are delighted that we have helped to create something to help improve the lives of the people of Thailand,” he said.

The two-lane highway, linking Buriram with the town of Borabue for the first time, is expected to be sealed and finished by the end of th? year. The ceremony marked the start of the homeward stretch for teams of more than 20

New Zealand Army engineers who have been working on the road in century-plus temperatures and swirling dust, interspersed with the rain and mud of the wet seasons, for more than five years.

The road has been one of New Zealand’s most ambitious—and trouble-plagued— Colombo Plan aid projects. New Zealand’s capital contributions have topped s2m apart from the expense of maintaining troops and families in Thailand since late in 1965.

“New Zealand is a small country, but you have a big heart,” said Governor Surawat. “We shall remember you every time we drive down this road.” Mechanical and climatic problems delayed progress on the road over the years, until new machinery arrived from

New Zealand last year and the road forged ahead to its new late-1971 completion date. Nearly a quarter of the work on the road, which carves through low-lying paddy fields giving about 250 remote villages access to the outside world, has been completed in the last six months. WIDE EFFECTS The value of the road, and its impact on the lives of the people, was clearly apparent as the convoy covered the road in a little over two

hours. Previously the journey between Borabue and Buriram took nine hours in a jeep and the route was passable only in dry weather. The convoy passed buses, trucks, a petrol station, a dispensary and numerous ponds created by excavations, which provide much-needed water for the peasant’s paddy fields.

The half-way town of Phayakkhaphum Phisai has gained new life since the road arrived, and its effect is similarly apparent at Sutuk, a few miles further on. New shops and buildings have gone up, a telegraph line linking the towns has followed the road, and peasant farmers can now get their previously subsistence crops to the markets of Maharasakam—where the New Zealanders are based—and the university town of Khon Kaen.

The New Zealand project manager (Major B. Jenkin) who has been acclaimed as the driving force behind the rapid progress of the last year, paid tribute to the 300 Thai workers on the road and the co-operation of the Thai Highways Department.