Since the unusual drought and water shortage of 1994, more country people have migrated to the towns and cities, adding to the overpopu- lation and congested traffic problems in Bangkok and other smaller cities. In particular, the forest fire at Huey Khakhaeng in Uthaithani, a national park and habitat for many endangered species and a world heritage site, destroyed some 25,000 acres of rain forest in 1994 and another 125,000 acres in 1998, which worsen Thailand’s drought and water shortage. Despite the legal prohibition against teak logging and the selfless forest conservation work of individual monks like Phra Prachak and Phra Khamkhian, the remaining forests have been further destroyed, in particular in 1998 at the Salawin national park in Maehongsorn. Those involved in this destruction of the forest included influential politicians and officials, military and police officers, as well as officials from the Forestry Department itself. The floods throughout Thailand in the 1990s and the 2000s, which were partly due to inadequate forests to absorb water from the monsoons, damaged hundreds of thousands of acres of agricultural farmland, increasing the poverty of upcountry farmers. Not surprisingly, young women and girls continue to take up prostitution, despite the threat of AIDS, and the number of people infected with HIV has been increasing.