Questions/Answers

Koh Libong is an important natural attraction of southern Thailand thanks to its rich marine and coastal resources that are home to the largest herd of dugongs, about 180 out of the country's approximately 400. This area has been experiencing considerable loss of marine resources, particularly seagrass and dugongs. The annual mortality rate of dugongs is very high, with at least 12 deaths per year. This was due to three main reasons: illegal fishing; dugong poaching; and marine accidents from tour boats. Therefore, the community has gathered and discussed to find solutions for preserving the creature and marine resource as well as creating a sustainable tourism business in community. The community has then decided to apply a “drone” technology as a tool to monitor coastal marine resources and dugongs including checking illegal fishing, instead of using patrol boats which are quite costly and cannot cover all areas. Recognizing this opportunity, the Digital Economy Promotion Agency (depa) has joined hands with the Koh Libong community, promoting and supporting them through financial, technological, and knowledge assistances to adopt the drone technology. This, in turn, helps reduce the loss of marine resources caused by illegal fishing, dugong poaching; reduce the deaths of dugongs from accidents caused by tourism boats; reduce costs and increase profits from tourism boat business; reduce the cost of patrolling; transfer knowledge on using drone technology for resource conservation and tourism to all groups of people in the Koh Libong community, ultimately leading to quality of life based on sustainable and inclusive principles related to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The outcome of using drone technology in community activities is members earn 11.5% increase of income (valued at 2,094,081 baht/year) while reducing operating costs of the tourism boat business and the cost of patrolling by 50 percent (196,290 baht/month).

This project builds a strong foundation for the community, providing both sustainable and inclusive solutions. Drone technologies allow community to manage and protect natural resources more proficiently and economically because they replace workforce on patrolling the island and also reduce all costs. Moreover, this technological assistance benefits all group of people in the community. For example, fisherman and boat charter can reduce the cost of fuel for taking tourists out to see dugongs as drones help locate their exact location. Koh Libong Community Enterprise also earn more income by collecting drone service fee from tourist boat business.

1) Goal 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities and Goal 15: Life on Land – This project creates an ecosystem that people and nature can live in harmony. Technologies improve both marine resources (dugongs) and the community economy. People in the area get a chance to learn how to use drones and a few have received a license to operate a drone. 2) Goal 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth – with assistance from depa, Libong’s tourism economy is systematically enhanced. As a result, drones can help community members earn an 11.5% increase (valued at 2,094,081 baht/year). Moreover, it reduces the operating costs of the tour boat business and the cost of patrolling reduced by 50 percent (valued at 196,290 baht/month). 3) GOAL 17: Partnerships to achieve the Goal – depa has collaborated with both public and people sectors. A memorandum of understanding between depa and the Community Organizations Development Institute has been signed to promote the use of technology for tourism and conservation of coastal resources of the Koh Libong Community Enterprise. depa and the Libong community have also invested in technologies, designed a business model and workplan, and built digital workforce to achieve the mutual goal.

depa has closely worked with the locals to create business model and sustainable technology management plans that can uplift the economy and society of the island. Moreover, depa and the local community have co-invested with 50:50 investment from both sides, allowing members of community to take ownership of the technology entirely. Also, with depa’s coaching, the community must a design long-term development plan and formulate its working guidelines. For example, the working guideline include taking the drone out to survey dugongs twice a day and reserving 5% of profits from boat rentals for drone maintenance.

Despite being defined as the 15th reserved wild animal and the last biggest herd of Thailand, dugongs in the Libong island have been neglected by the public sectors. The locals are therefore forced to take care of the precious marine resources by themselves, both physically and financially. But once being shown how how drone could make easier their ways of life, the big change in the Libong community has begun. In the past, using boats to patrol the illegal fishing and dugong poaching could cost over 20,000 baht per trip, resulting in large areas being uncovered and surveys being done only once a month. The use of survey drone for marine and coastal conservation activities introduced by depa, however, allows site surveys to be carried out thoroughly in all areas of the island. This is largely due to a sharp fall of survey cost at only 150 baht per time. There is also a decrease in illegal fishing cases, leading to a drop of dugongs’ death rate. The number of natural resources are also becoming more abundant, and people have sufficient resources for sustainable consumption, as well as enough for future generations.

Drone technology applied in this project offers benefits to all groups of people in the community. Everyone, regardless of age or gender, can learn using the technology from an expert supported by depa. Women, housewives and shopkeepers can also earn income from selling goods and services to tourists who travel to the island. The elderly and people with disabilities gain opportunities to witness dugongs in the wild through live broadcast from the drone, just like tourists who physically come to visit these animals at the Libong island.

The project provides the following outcomes: 1) The number of illegal fishing is reduced, leading to the revival of dugongs and marine and coastal resources in the Libong areas. Local fishermen and communities are also getting higher yields. 2) Local tour boat operators are making more direct profits as they can save on fuel costs from shorter time and distance it takes to locate the dugongs. 3) As the number of tourist increases, local entrepreneurs and service providers are earning more income. The local tourism ecosystem also includes grocery, souvenirs, and food stores. 4) The Libong Island Tourism and Occupational Development Community Enterprise earn more income from membership fees, allowing more money to be spent on public activities. 5) There is a new job opportunity in the community. A licensed pilot who fly the drone are getting paid for the service delivered.

Implementation strategies and steps are shown in the details below: 1) Call for application: depa has set and published a clear process of promotion/ funding measures on its website, as well as disseminating such information via forums, seminars or related channels to call for application. Once the project applications arrive, a provincial committee, consisting of government bodies, educational institutions, and businesses, will review the projects before submitting them to depa for funding consideration. 2) New culture creation: depa has shifted away from the traditional funding method of giving full financial assistance/ grants to providing a partial one, with only 50% support, to qualified applicants. This new way aims to build the sense of project ownership to the community. For example, the Libong community did put in 50% investment into this drone project. 3) Clear job assignment and monitoring: a clear job description is given to each role in the project. The community must also submit a monthly report to depa to ensure the project progress in terms of both technical content and finance. 4) Human resource and budget allocation: depa has supported the Libong project by providing 50% funding as well as providing technical experts to help with the implementation of the project. In 2022, depa will continue on approaching communities with strong leadership and will to transform themselves with technology and innovation, just like the Libong community.

Under depa’s funding scheme, the Libong community had to provide 50% co-investment in the project, which was valued at 122,700 baht. At the early stage, members struggled to raise enough money causing a delay in project implementation. However, the community themselves found a way to solve the problem by organizing a fundraising event called “tea-drinking party,” inviting people, government agencies, and private sectors in the area to buy into the project and donate money. The financial goal was finally reached, and with such determination on the community’s part the project later became a big success.

The Libong project is considered as the pilot model for Trang province and nearby provinces. Survey drone technology is used to preserve and conserve dugongs and other natural resources, resulting in better environment as well as better community tourism economy. Moreover, as the drone can take pictures and send data to store in the cloud, the obtained aerial photographs can be used as evidence of illegal fishing that could lead to arrest and prosecution. Aerial photographs of dugongs can also be used to map the dugongs habitat and to make an assessment and conservation plan by the community.

This project represents the first model using drone to protect the dugongs, conserve marine resources, and improve the local community economy. The project drew inspiration from other communities that were using drones to spray fertilizers and chemicals on farmland, which were both speedy and cost-efficient. Therefore, the community came up with the idea of using drones to protect the dugongs and conserve other marine resources.

Survey drone technology has been used for the following activities: 1) To patrol during nighttime to keep watch on coastal marine resources and illegal fishing activities in order to reduce the death rate of dugongs and destruction of seagrass areas 2) To find dugongs’ location during the day and send the notification to tour boat operators so that they can take tourists to the safe area for watching dugongs, reducing the number of dugongs being hit by the tour boats. 3) To broadcast dugongs in real time for tourists in vulnerable groups such as young kids, pregnant women and the elderly.

depa has taken lesson learned from the project and extended the implementation of digital community transformation to other communities country-wide, through a so-called “depa Digital transformation for Community.” To date, 176 communities have been supported and more will be developed in fiscal year 2022. This expansion scheme is already mandated in depa’s action plan and the budget has been allocated to expand the operation to 2,000 communities. Moreover, depa has been working with the private sector in joint investments and also in requesting budget allocations from related funds in order to expand the project in all areas.

no

The project is mainly supported by 2 resources: 1) Financial resource with a 50:50 scheme: the total value of the project is 245,400 baht, which are half granted by depa, at 122,700 baht, and another half by the Libong community through fundraising. The fundraising event was held and well supported by members of the community. 2) Human resource: the human resources can be divided into two parts; Libong community and depa officers. The locals are the main operators who monitor and manage the project while depa provides expert consultants working closely with the community.

To sustain the project overtime, involvement of local people plays a significant role. The locals take part in every step of the project implementation, starting from brainstorming to draft the project’s framework, co-investing with depa in drone technology, raising fund from the community members, selecting 3 potential members to learn how to fly the drone and then get a license, to creating a knowledge sharing space for both Libong and nearby communities. In addition, the monthly reports on performance and finance are required for data collection, data analysis and further improvement of the plan.

Yes

The project was evaluated both internally and externally. Internally, the Department of Strategic Management of depa was in charge of closely monitoring and evaluating the project outcomes. Externally, the Center for Economic and Business Forecasting of the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce took the role of third party evaluator, visiting the Libong community enterprise in November 2021 to assess the project's socio-economic impact through in-depth interviews with stakeholders.

Indicators are mainly divided into 2 types: economic impact and social impact. The economic indicators include an increase in net income, increase in investment, and reduction in costs of fuel, while social indicators comprise spending on environmental management and increase in employment of local people. Two assessment tools are used to evaluate the project. One is the revealed preference which applies and compares real market prices for assessment and the other is the stated preference, which determines the value of things by asking buyers the price they would be willing to pay if the item were to be traded.

According to both evaluation results, the main findings present the significance of drone technology in improving economic and outcomes. 20 community members have been trained to fly the drone and 3 of them being licensed. The experience gained from this project is the foundation of sustainability for the local community. Also, a knowledge sharing platform has been created to transfer technology and ideas to more people in own community and nearby communities. The use of technology has become a driving force connecting various groups of people in the community to work together and enjoy benefits.

This project was driven to success by cross-sector collaboration of government, private and social sectors. First, depa joined hands with Community Organizations Development Institute (CODI) through a memorandum of cooperation on promoting and supporting the community to apply digital technology and innovation for smart tourism and coastal resources conservation for Koh Libong. Then, depa and the Libong Island Tourism and Occupational Development Community Enterprise co-developed a feasibility plan that include the operational model being used until present. While at the beginning depa helped the community in designing the business model, drafting a technology management plan and financial plans and monitoring all indicators, the community now could continue their operations and expand in to other areas, without depa’s help.

This project is achieved by help from various government organizations and the people of the Libong island, along with Trang Provincial Office, Community Organization Development Institute (CODI), Pracharat Samakkee Ltd., and Trang Non-hunting Area Office, Ministry of natural and environment. depa acts as the mentor to help the locals design best solutions for their existing problems and also make the strategic and long-term plan including all economic, social and natural conservation aspects. Furthermore, depa’s 50:50 funding scheme has encouraged members of the community to choose a technology to fit their needs but the community must raise funds to fulfill the other half. The CODI plays an important role acting as coach for the locals as well as operating activities and coordinating across sectors. Also, Trang provincial office, Pracharat Samakkee Ltd., and Trang Non-Hunting Area Office, Ministry of Natural and Environment are all supportive of the expansion of this project.

Since the project started in 2019, depa has been closely monitoring the outcomes which are beyond expectation. This initiative is the first model from a government actor that utilizes technology for protection and preservation of natural resources and wild life. Recognizing the impact of this type of project, depa expanded the initiative to help 176 communities during 2019-2020 through “depa Digital transformation for Community Fund.” Then, in 2021 depa received government funding to scale up the project to cover over 836 communities across the country. Also, for better efficiency depa has invited the private sector to provide join this long-term project, planning to cover more than 2,000 communities in 2022.