The Theun-Hinboun Expansion Project is leading to the displacement of over 7,500 mostly ethnic minority people and negatively affecting another 48,441 people living downstream, on project construction lands and in host villages. The extra erosion, sedimentation and aggravated flooding from additional flows in the Hai and Hinboun Rivers is exacerbating the problems faced by villagers downstream who have relied on subsistence farming and gathering forest foods.

Failure to Provide Adequate Livelihood Support for Displaced People
A fundamental problem with the THXP is the lack of adequate and productive replacement land for the displaced villagers. People from villages that have been inundated have been moved into host communities where land and resources are already scarce. The consequent increase in the population in the host villages is already leading to fierce competition over natural resources, and social tensions. A second, but equally significant, problem is the inadequacy of the livelihood restoration measures currently being implemented, which consist of unproven, under-funded experiments in small scale market-oriented farming, livestock raising and artificial fish ponds.

Devastating Downstream Impacts
Theun Hinboun Expansion Project's  impacts on the Nam Hai and the Nam Hinboun are severe as the project doubles water releases into these recipient rivers. The project significantly increases the frequency and duration of flooding along the Nam Hai and Nam Hinboun, is expected to lead to even greater erosion along the riverbanks. Fisheries in the Hinboun River, which have already been severely impacted by the original Theun Hinboun Hydropower Project, are expected to be further decimated. Yet despite the fact that seven years of THPC’s environmental and social mitigation activities have failed to address the devastating impacts of the existing Theun-Hinboun project, the RAP makes the optimistic assumption that the impacts from the new THXP can be managed and livelihoods restored. There is no justification for this assertion.

The increased flooding along the Hai and Hinboun will make life unbearable for many residents. There is in fact no certainty how many people in which villages downstream will be required to relocate as a result of the aggravated flooding, whether there is sufficient land available, and if not, where people will move.

The result of THXP will be even greater food insecurity amongst people who  are already suffering as a result of the existing Theun-Hinboun project, making life unbearable for many Hai and Hinboun residents. Now, many young people in the downstream villages say they believe that the only sustainable future is one in which they migrate to nearby towns in order to earn cash incomes to raise their own family and support the older generation.

The World Commission on Dams found that women and ethnic minorities were disproportionately affected by dam projects. As women are often responsible for ensuring the sustainable livelihoods of their families, impacts on these livelihoods through destruction of fisheries, flooding of agricultural land and forests, and displacement often result in women bearing a disproportionate share of the costs. It is women who are often left with the burden of caring for their families, finding alternative land and water sources and alternative livelihoods when these are taken away through the development of destructive dam projects.

The Theun-Hinboun Expansion Project mitigation plans underestimate the risks to fish stocks downstream of the project in the Theun-Kading River and the Hai and Hinboun rivers. Baseline studies of fisheries have never been done, and as displaced villagers are attesting, artificial fish ponds do not offer the kind of food security as wild fisheries catches once did. 

At the site of the reservoir, a section of the surrounding forest area has been designated as a new national protected area. However, given the increased access to the area created by the construction process and road development, conservation of the forests remains in question.