Environment and natural resources

Farmers along the Mekong have been told to expect a worse drought than the brutal water shortages that gripped the region before this year’s rains arrived.  Severe or extreme drought is forecast to affect Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam before the next wet season, threatening agricultural production. The Mekong ...

Up to 9.1 tonnes of potential plastic waste was being dumped into the Vu Gia-Thu Bồn River basin, one of nine largest river systems in Việt Nam, each day, equating to 2,600 tonnes each year. The information was included in a report on waste management released by ...

Thailand is joining hands with six other Asian countries to try and tackle the issue of marine pollution, amid increasing criticism about plastic use in the region. Under a project called “Rethinking Plastics: Circular Economy Solutions to Marine Litter”, Thailand — along with China, Indonesia, Japan, ...

Southeast Asian countries, among the world’s worst ocean polluters, need tougher regulations for plastic packaging to curb leakage, a United Nations report said on Wednesday. Southeast Asia is a major contributor to land-based plastic waste leaking into the world’s oceans, with more than half of it ...

The Mekong River Delta is lower than previously thought. Ground subsidence and rising sea levels threaten the lives of more than 21 million people who inhabit the region as well as Vietnam’s food security since the latter grows 56 per cent of the country’s rice. The ...

The animals of Southeast Asia’s tropical rainforests are under threat. As if deforestation and habitat degradation weren’t enough to contend with, cheap, easy-to-produce illegal snares are being set at an alarming rate in the last refuges for wildlife in the region, indiscriminately killing and maiming ...

The Board of the Green Climate Fund (GCF), a major funder of climate projects, has approved a US$10 million project that’s expected to benefit 10 per cent of Laos’ population. The project is using nature-based solutions in four cities to build resilience towards ever-increasing floods ...

My grandfather turned his head and watched as his house was engulfed in the devastating water.  On a tiny boat, my grandparents and their neighbours carried some clothes wrapped in plastic sheets, leaving the village for higher ground. It was November 2, 1999, when strong cold ...

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said “there is no scientific basis” to the recent prediction that the Mekong Delta will be submerged in 30-50 years. The PM said Friday that a paper warning the Mekong Delta could be submerged underwater by 2050 lacks scientific backing. While admitting ...

Typically this time of the year in the Mekong Basin, the annual monsoon is beginning to taper off, the mighty river’s banks are spilling over and saturating the flood plain in Cambodia and Vietnam and the river is moving millions of tonnes of sediment alongside ...