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An estimated 80 per cent of Chinese energy imports pass through the chokepoint of the Strait of Malacca.
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Chinese energy security rests on a solution to the “Malacca Dilemma”, a term introduced by former president Hu Jintao. One wry observer estimated a great number of Thai forest reserves have been logged over the years to supply the paper for canal feasibility studies, let alone the land bridge, and the last two Thai prime ministers to show interest also had their deliberations interrupted by coup.īut the attraction to China seems obvious. If built, a Thai Land Bridge would provide an alternative route cutting approximately 650 nautical miles and two to three days from a journey through the busy Strait of Malacca, saving transport costs, reducing the risk of piracy and easing pressure on a waterway forecasted to exceed its capacity in the next ten years. Supporters of the idea also estimated it would fit into a combined budget less than the extraordinary US$55 billion projected to be required to dig a canal. This land-based route would avoid major drawbacks involved in digging a canal, such as environmental waste and cutting off a southern part of the country embroiled in insurgency. The concept of a sea passage linking the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea was dismissed by the government in 2020 the dream of a Kra Canal became a Thai Land Bridge, utilizing road and railway networks to transport goods to and from deep sea ports on each coast.
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Now, according to one Thai parliamentarian, China might have an ambition to create it – but there’s a twist. At different times in history, the French wanted to build it, the British sought to block it, and successive Thai governments have investigated its viability in recent decades. The canal is seen as an option to bypass the longer and congested route through the Strait of Malacca, the narrow sea lane that runs between modern-day Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore and carries 25 percent of the world’s traded goods. But this idea of a “Kra Canal” has persisted through the centuries since. The engineer returned with the unhappy verdict that the project was impossible. He sent an engineer south to investigate the possibility of excavating a vast waterway through the narrowest part of the Malay Peninsula, known as the Kra Isthmus, with the hope of opening a direct trade route between Siam and Burma – imagine a Suez of Southeast Asia, if you will. The Titiwangsa Mountains are located southwards, 45 km (28 mi) from Songkhla.In 1677, the Thai monarch Narai the Great had a dream. The southern part is called the Phuket chain, which is a continuation of the greater Tenasserim range, extending further northwards for over 400 km (250 mi) beyond the Three Pagodas Pass. The Isthmus of Kra marks the boundary between two sections of the central cordillera, the mountain chain which runs from Tibet through all of the Malay peninsula. The Isthmus is named after the town Kra Buri, in the Ranong province of Thailand, which is located at the west side of the narrowest part. The narrowest part between the estuary of the Kra River and the bay of Sawi near the city Chumphon has a width of 44 km (27 mi), and has a maximum altitude of 75 m (246 ft) above sea level. To the west of the Isthmus is the Andaman Sea, and to the east is the Gulf of Thailand. The east part of the landbridge belongs to Thailand, while the west part belongs to the Tanintharyi division of Myanmar.