Ref ID:	32819
Ref Type:	Journal Article
Authors:	Penny, Dan Grindrod, John Bishop, Paul
Title:	Holocene palaeoenvironmental reconstruction based on microfossil analysis of a lake sediment core, Nong Han Kumphawapi, Udon Thani, northeast Thailand
Date:	1996
Source:	Asian Perspectives (1996)
Notes:	this is the title on the first page of the article, the title in the ToC is different
Abstract:	Pollen, phytolith, and charcoal analyses are presented for a Holocene lake sediment core from Northeast Thailand. The evidence shows that major environmental changes occurred around 6500 years BP, when there appears to have been a decline in regional arboreal taxa and the establishment of permanent swamp or lake conditions at the core site. These findings are inconsistent with other climatic reconstruction for the region. These changes could have been the result of human activities, such as the clearance of dryland vegetation by the use of fire. Although this suggests the possible beginnings of cultivation, the authors find it unlikely that intensive wet-rice agriculture was being practiced at this time. They find it more reasonable to conclude that this early evidence for forest clearance represents the intensification of human occupation. They conclude that wet-rice agriculture in bunded fields (widely used throughout SE Asia today) did not develop prior to 2000 years BP in Northeast Thailand. Furthermore, the palynological evidence suggests that wet-rice agriculture did not develop all of a sudden in this region, but rather gradually over the past 2000 years.
Date Created:	12/28/2002
Volume:	35
Number:	2
Page Start:	209
Page End:	228