Both in terms of area and population, the fifteen changwads of the North-east constitute the largest of the four basic regions in the Kingdom of Thailand. Recent census data indicate that 37.9 per cent of the 3.2 million Thai farm households live in this region cultivating a similar proportion of the country's 69.7 million rai (I rai = 0.395 acre) of land in agricultural holdings. However, the region seems to have more than its fair share of the problems which stand in the way of the Government's efforts to accelerate the country's economic development. At present, the solution to the ‘North-east Problem’ remains as elusive as it was a decade ago. In spite of the impressive amount of public expenditure already poured into the region for improving the infra-structure and providing a wide range of rural facilities, together with an ever-increasing amount of services rendered by national and international agencies for planning and implementing the processes of growth, the per caput income of the North-easterner still lags as far behind that of his fellow countryman residing elsewhere in the kingdom as it did in the recent past. This article attempts to analyse the interaction of the physical conditions and socio-economic problems which are bound up in the existing land-use system of the North-east.