The Economist has a correspondent traveling in rural Thailand to view the impacts of globalization there. Recently visiting a rural market to see whether the traders are feeling the pinch from the opening of a Tesco a few miles away, the correspondent reports:

Are these local traders feeling the heat from the giant superstore down the road? Not really, say the handful that we talk to: Tesco’s opening doesn’t seem to have had much effect on the market’s trade at all. As the retailer itself points out, even the supposedly threatened “mom and pop” stores are often benefiting from Tesco’s spread, because they can buy their supplies from the nearest superstore and sell it on at a small mark-up, rather than having to rely on inefficient and expensive wholesalers, as before. It is probably much the same as we found with the fishermen on the Mun river: those who are suffering make a big noise about it while those who are unaffected or actually benefiting from the change remain quiet.