The National Legislative Assembly (NLA) says it has helped solve a problem involving locals' land overlapping with forest reserves in Uttaradit, with about 1,000 people set to obtain legal rights for land use.
The move is part of an NLA-initiated project to determine local needs and problems to pass them on to state agencies to resolve.
The NLA yesterday held a forum titled "NLA meets the people from 76 provinces" at the parliament building, attended by more than 700 provincial representatives, provincial governors, local administrative officials, and representatives of the government.
At the forum, local problems and opinions which were gathered by lawmakers during their visits to provinces across the country were discussed and relayed to relevant agencies.
NLA vice president Peerasak Porjit said the problems are divided into seven areas that need to be solved -- land, water sources, agriculture, transport, economy, environment, and social issues.
In particular, the NLA has coordinated efforts to successfully resolve a dispute involving people encroaching on protected forests in Uttaradit. The dispute affected 1,002 people across 6,000 rai of land that overlapped forest reserves in Tha Pla district.
An NLA subcommittee helped bring the problem to the attention of the cabinet which on May 31, 2016 approved in principle a draft ministerial regulation to strip land there of its forest reserve status.
The ministerial regulation was published later in the Royal Gazette and took effect on June 23, 2016, paving the way for the people affected by the dispute to obtain legal land use documents, Mr Peerasak said.
Disputes about people encroaching on protected forests has been a perennial problem in Thailand. In several cases, designated boundaries for forest reserves or natural parks are unrealistic, and they overlap with areas where people have been living in peace for centuries.
The assembly has so far sent at least three reports detailing problems facing local people to the government each month, Mr Peerasak said, adding the information had been used to boost cooperation among ministries and agencies.
