In the Nakai Plateau, the POE estimated that 50 percent of the people were below the Lao PDR's poverty line. Furthermore, the poor in these areas were increasingly reliant on food relief due to crop failures. They also had no access to medical facilities. Intensifying these problems, the population growth rate was nearing three percent. The POE attributes many of these problems to the declining populations of natural predators in the ecosystem due to overhunting by the indigenous people and foreign poachers. These opinions are grounded with correlational evidence that shows a sharp increase of insects and rodents that intensified the famines and diseases in the area. The POE also found four indigenous cultures: the Atel, the Themarou, the Mlengbrou, and the Ahoe that would become extinct by the early 21st century without foreign intervention. The POE believed that a wider range of economic opportunities created by the project would provide members of these cultures with the means of survival and an escape from poverty. The POE was also swayed by the commitment of the consortium (NTEC) to improve the living standards of impacted people beyond the standards required by the World Bank. Its involvement in the drafting of a national resettlement policy for development projects would help the Nam Theun 2 project become a model for future development projects both in Laos and the rest of the world. Most importantly, the consortium agreed to make one million dollars available annually for thirty years to protect National Biodiversity Conservation Area. The POE determined that the dam would be built regardless of the World Bank's Participation and, with its involvement, greater credence and would be given to remedy the social and environmental externalities associated with the project. The POE deemed that Laos had two major resources that could be exploited to generate enough revenue to raise the living standards throughout the country. In 1997, the POE estimated that large-scale deforestation and lumbering provided 40 percent of the foreign exchange for Laos. Due to deforestation caused by the conversion to agriculture and this lumbering, the POE believed that this process was unsustainable. As such, the government would seek to utilize hydropower to facilitate development. Given previous projects in the Bolaven Plateau in southern Laos, the POE believed that the government alone could not be looked to account and provide for the negative externalities associated with the project. In the interest of biodiversity