Shortcomings of economic cooperation in the Greater Mekong...The Greater Mekong Subregion: A Regional Fantasy... The document critically examines the Greater Mekong Subregion Economic Cooperation (GMS) Programme, which was initiated by the Asian Development Bank in 1992 to boost economic development in the resource rich region. It outlines the main features of the programme and highlights the shortcomings and problem of the GMS: * the centrality of natural resource exploitation (water, land, forests, energy, minerals, fisheries) results in the large-scale expropriation of resources crucial to daily sustenance * the distribution of benefits is uneven since participating countries have differing levels of development and capacity (i.e. what does the Lao PDR gain from the East-West Corridor?) * internal disparities within participating countries are widened because of pockets of high capital and infrastructure investment in specific parts of countries, which can result in tensions and conflicts between national and local government, and between the government and the people * the vision of development promoted through the GMS serves regional investment, and not national or local development priorities: projects are formulated based on their potential for profits for investors rather than on their potential to respond to social, economic, ecological or institutional needs among local and national communities * GMS projects have already resulted in negative impacts on local communities through road and hydropower projects, impacts include displacement of families, loss of livelihood sources, loss of lands, among others * in the GMS framework, the rights of investors are protected, but the rights of local people and communities are not * local-national communities outside of governments and private sector have not been involved in drawing up GMS plans * the financing of GMS projects have tremendous debt implications for participating countries: new forms of project financing are creating new forms of debt and financial liabilities * governments play conflicting roles as owners, investors and regulators in public-private partnerships in infrastructure projects * GMS projects facilitate the transfer of local-national wealth to private actors external to the Mekong region.