The Bangkok Post

More than 20 years ago, when two Chiang Rai-based environmentalists, Niwat Roikaew and Somkiat Kuenwongsa, learned that the Chinese government were blasting rapids in the upper Mekong River from Yunnan to Myanmar and Laos to clear the way for large commercial vessels, they started worrying. Back ...

The government threatened on Tuesday not to buy electricity from Sanakham dam in Laos after it learned the project might affect the Mekong River. “The country’s territory is our paramount concern,” Somkiat Prajamwong, secretary-general to the Office of National Water Resources, said on Tuesday after a seminar ...

Thailand’s energy authority plans to add Singapore to its regional energy grid by 2023, along with Cambodia and Myanmar, said Kulit Sombatsiri, permanent secretary for energy. The move follows the success of a Laos-Thailand-Malaysia deal, in which Thailand buys electricity from hydroelectric power plants in Laos ...

Thailand finds itself in a pressure cooker these days, dealing with pre-Covid-19 economic weaknesses, the lack of longer-term responses to the economic and social crises from the pandemic, and uncertainty about how much longer people can hold on before falling into poverty, losing jobs or ...

Health officials in Nakhon Ratchasima admit that eight children have been infected with Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) but deny there’s been an outbreak of the airborne disease in nurseries. The children were aged 2-5 and are recovering after receiving hospital treatment, said Dr Narinrat Pichayakamin, a ...

Deputy Transport Minister Thaworn Senneam called for the appointment of a committee on safe labour mobility during the 24th Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Ministerial Conference held online on Wednesday. The meeting was also attended by GMS ministers from Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. The ...

The Thai Rice Exporters Association recently revised its estimation of Thai rice exports this year to five million tonnes, the lowest in 20 years, from a previous projection of 6.5 million tonnes. In contrast, India’s Rice Exporters Association estimates the country’s rice exports will jump by ...

The cabinet has approved two draft memorandums of understanding (MOU) that will set in motion the effective management of water resources for countries connected to the Mekong River, says the Office of National Water Resources (ONWR). The MOUs will establish international cooperation under the Mekong-Lancang Cooperation ...

Thailand has become one of the world’s largest garbage dumps after China banned waste imports, including electronics and plastics, from foreign countries in 2017. As a result, waste from many countries that was originally shipped to China is now being redirected to countries in Southeast ...

The Defence Ministry will donate 20 mobile negative pressure cabinets to Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia and Myanmar to support their efforts to control the spread of the novel coronavirus. Negative pressure cabinets allow medical staff to safely collect respiratory secretions from patients infected with Covid-19. Ministry spokesman, Lt ...