very clear and concrete goal. Since the official launch of the LMC mechanism in March 2016, it has established a “3+5” mechanism of cooperation, referring to the three cooperation pillars — political and security issues, economic and sustainable development, and cultural and people-to-people exchanges — and the five key priority areas of connectivity, production capacity, cross-border economic cooperation, water resources, agriculture, and poverty reduction (Fei & Lu, 2018). These are in line with the wishes and needs of the Mainland ASEAN countries. Second, the organization of the LMC is rapidly improving the mechanism of construction and the LMC’s institutional platform building has made steady progress, with a four-tiered dialogue mechanism at the different levels in place consisting of meetings among leaders, foreign ministers, senior officials, and working groups (Xinhua News Agency, 2018f). Third, the regional cooperation projects have quickly achieved concrete results. By the end of 2017, most of the 45 early harvest projects identified at the first LMC leaders’ meeting and the 13 initiatives put forward by China at the second LMC foreign ministers’ meeting have been completed or have made substantive progress (Xinhua News Agency, 2018e).
The LMC mechanism has produced better-than-expected progress over the past two years as the countries moved forward with the principle of equality and inclusiveness, having development as a priority, and defining the LMC culture with equality, sincerity, mutual assistance, and kinship. “The reason why the Lancang–Mekong cooperation mechanism has enjoyed rapid development is that the mechanism accords with the six nations’ common willingness to enhance all-win cooperation and the trend of regional economic integration,” just as Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said, “It has shown strong vitality since it was born” (Xinhua News Agency, 2018f).
Undoubtedly, the member countries of the LMC, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and China, are fully aware of the opportunities that this cooperation mechanism brings to them.
The main reason why China advocates the establishment of the LMC platform is to promote the development of the lower Mekong region and to share the fruits and experiences of China’s economic development. To this end, China, as the main provider of funding for this cooperation mechanism, has delivered substantial financial assistance to the region. Since the two years from the first LMC Leaders’ Meeting in 2016, China has pledged, under the LMC framework, to provide concessional loans of up to 10 billion Yuan (US$1.6 billion) and credit loans totaling another 10 billion Yuan to promote industrial capacity cooperation and infrastructure construction within the region. Additionally, China is committed to prioritizing the Mekong area for spending in the South–South cooperation aid fund totaling US$200 million, as well as setting up an LMC special fund to provide US$300 million in five years to support small and medium-sized cooperation projects within the region. (Wang, 2018) China has also promised to support poverty alleviation in these countries with US$200 million in aid and to prepare another US$300 million to fund small and medium-sized cooperation projects in the next five years. (Liu, 2016) These funds span connectivity, production capacity, cross-border economic cooperation, water resources management, as well as agriculture and poverty reduction, benefitting tens of millions of people living on the waterway (Xinhua News Agency, 2018b).
Under the framework of the LMC cooperation, economic relations between China and the Mekong sub-region have drastically expanded. For example, in the first 10 months of 2017, trade between China and the other five countries in the Lancang–Mekong area reached US$17.76 billion, up by 15.6% on the same period in the previous year. In the same period, China’s investment in the five countries reached US$2.68 billion, up 22.3% on the previous year (Xinhua News Agency, 2018e).
Taking into account the history and the present situation, the infrastructure construction of the Mekong sub-region lags seriously behind and has become a major obstacle to the socio-economic development of the region. Therefore, improving infrastructure has become one of the main goals of the LMC to boost regional development. With the development of LMC, some major projects are moving forward smoothly, such as the construction of the China–Laos Railway as well as the China–Thailand Railway. At the same time, river regulation in the Mekong River has also improved its transportation capacity. Now the river can accommodate ships weighing up to 420 tons, while in the past the river could only allow boats weighing less than 50 tons. According to statistical data, about 97,000 tons of cargo were transported through Guanlei Port in 2016, a year-on-year increase of 45.9%. With growing inter-governmental cooperation, sailing along the river has become much safer (Xinhua News Agency, 2017).
As social and cultural exchanges are also major areas of the LMC, people-to-people and cultural exchanges between China and the Mainland ASEAN countries have been strengthened. To this effect, to promote social and cultural exchanges and to accelerate human resource cultivation, the Chinese government has provided 18,000 scholarships and 5,000 exchange internships for member countries (Teo & Tan, 2016).
Because of the different situations of the member states, their expectations in regard to the LMC are also different. Thus, in the process of implementing the platform of the cooperation mechanism, China has focused on precise policies according to the situation of each country in order to address the development needs and strategies of various countries and to provide better assistance to these countries.
Thailand was considered to have had an important role in creating the LMC in the year 2014. As a country that relies significantly on the benefits of the Mekong River, Thailand uses the river as a water resource for agricultural use, industrial use, and for creating electricity. Thailand consistently supports a closer relationship between the Mekong sub-regions in order to support a closer and healthier mechanism between the countries, creating a peaceful future together. Additionally, under the military government of the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO), the relationship between Thailand and China has become closer, both politically and economically. China has invested significantly in Thailand; in 2016, there were 69 projects that were supported by China, with investment in those projects alone reaching 242,888 million Baht — a 120% increase from 2015. Thus, China has become the second largest investor in Thailand, second only to Japan (Thai News Agency, 2016).
Thailand views this cooperation framework as a common theme in the river basin, being the driving force behind the development of the bilateral relationship between the two countries. It is the stage for Thailand to play a prominent role in the Greater Mekong Sub-region. China is also fully aware of Thailand’s aspirations and respects its position and role in the cooperation of the Mekong sub-region. So, the First LMC Leaders’ Meeting held in Sanya, China, was co-chaired by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Thai Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha.
Furthermore, Thailand also wants to push the cooperation framework to be more modern, with an emphasis on technology and innovation. This is to support the region as a whole by strengthening forces from within and to connect the region to the global market. Moreover, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is another key union for economic and development benefit of the region, connecting the Mekong sub-region and China. Thailand views this framework as an important mechanism to push the region as an economic hub and to build sustainable development using advanced tools. This is in line with Thailand’s policies and projects, namely, the “Thailand 4.0” policy, the Eastern Special Economic Zone (EEC), and the Thailand policy +1 (Zhou, 2018). The objective is to develop a strong resource management among the countries and to improve the water distribution among the involved countries based on mutual needs and responsibilities. This will help to strengthen the agricultural sector of each country and will lead to sustainable development of all the countries in the region. The collaboration mechanism will also promote exchanges and cooperation on culture and humanity. The exchanges between China and Thailand have increased significantly in the past year, with over 90 million Chinese tourists in Thailand and over 3,000 students studying in Thailand. Thailand also has approximately 20,000 students studying in China — the highest number of foreign students in that country.
Thus, it can be seen that with the support of China, Thailand has played an important role in the Mekong sub-region cooperation framework and will continue to be one of the major forces in the successful development of the region.
Even though Laos is a small country with no access to the ocean, it is also a major player in the Greater Mekong Sub-region. The Mekong River is a very important river in Laos.