Japanese conglomerate Hitachi is looking to Mekong Delta to boost infrastructure demand as modernization takes hold in Southeast Asia. Hitachi’s Asia and India chairman Kojin Nakakita sat down with Bloomberg’s Haslinda Amin on the sideline of Asean WEF Summit in Hanoi. Hitachi sees Southeast Asia ...

Water in the Mekong River at this border town is rising alarmingly and municipality officials are preparing to shut drainage outlet pipes to prevent water from the river seeping into the city and causing flooding, reports said. on August 17, the river level was 10.19 ...

Despite efforts to reduce costs and increase yields, Vietnam’s coffee exports have faced a difficult year, delegates heard at a seminar in Ho Chi Minh City on 2 December. “The international coffee market has seen unexpected trends and seriously impacted Vietnamese exports,” Deputy Minister of Agriculture ...

The European Parliament (EP) adopted an official resolution ratifying the Vietnam – EU Partnership and Co-operation Agreement (PCA), at a plenary session in Strasbourg city, France, on 17 December. The resolution welcomes Vietnam’s outcomes in doi moi (renewal) and integration over the past time and hails ...

Vietnam, whose low-wage economy relies on exports, is likely to be the biggest winner of the Trans-Pacific Partnership that slashes an estimated 18,000 tariffs among the dozen participating countries.   In a decade, the country’s gross domestic product will be boosted 11 percent, or $36 billion, as ...

Brace yourselves: 2016 could be the hottest year on record, bringing high temperatures, drought and perhaps more flooding to Myanmar, weather experts warn. The culprit is the El Niño phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean, reckoned to be the most powerful ever, said meteorologist U Tun Lwin. Its ...

Severe smog was recorded at air quality monitoring stations in five upper northern provinces on Tuesday, the Department of Pollution Control (DPC) reported.The department reported that severe PM2.5 pollution was detected by eight air quality monitoring stations in Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Phayao, Mae Hong ...

A 30-month study by Vietnamese researchers on the impact of 11 proposed hydroelectric dams in the Lower Mekong Basin has found that the economic damage to Cambodia alone will be worth some $450 million per year. According to the researchers, the Mekong River at Kratie could, ...

Kratie provincial military police have seized two vans full of illegal timber and are seeking to identify the source of the timber and those behind its transportation. Mao Rainny, Kratie provincial deputy military police commander, yesterday said that provincial military police cooperated with National Military Police ...

The haze from forest fires in Indonesia has reached southern Thailand, with smoke from the dust particles rising above safety levels in Songkhla province’s Hat Yai district. Songhkla Governor Songpol Sawasditham on 5 October set up a war room to combat the impact of the haze ...

In response to protests outside the site of a controversial, re-launched copper mine, the company behind the project released a statement ridiculing the demonstration as representing a reckless minority. Residents are calling on the government to intervene, and have said the mine should not be allowed ...

Thailand on Saturday returned 16 ancient artefacts recovered from smugglers to Cambodia. The handover ceremony was held at the Foreign Ministry during a two-day visit to Thailand by Cambodian Foreign Affairs Minister Hor Namhong.  “It is my great pleasure to hand over these 16 antiquities through you ...

Today is the United Nations’ (UN) International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, numbering an estimated 370 million in 90 countries and speaking roughly 7,000 languages. To mark it, the Guardian interviews Kankanaey Igorot woman Victoria Tauli-Corpuz about the UN’s Declaration on the Rights of ...

Vietnam’s stocks just had a rough week after bad news kept hitting the markets, prompting many investors to dump a large number of bank shares amid a broad sell-off.  The benchmark VN-Index dropped to 556.30 at the 3 p.m. close on 21 August, shedding nearly 17 ...

Women migrant workers in parts of Asia risk being deported if they become pregnant, forcing many to have unwanted abortions or abandon their newborns, researchers said on Monday. Migrant workers in garment and footwear factories are forced to undergo regular pregnancy tests, according to the ...

An experimental vaccine against dengue, the world’s most common mosquito-borne virus, was 100% effective in early trials in Miami, and could speed up the pace of a vaccine against Zika, researchers said on 16 March. Dengue, which is in the same family of flaviviruses as Zika ...

Nation University is waging a campaign against online sexual harassment to address a still largely ignored problem.​ The campaign has called on people to take a stand against sexual abuse. Supporters of the campaign are encouraged to express their support online and include #stopcybersexualharassment, @StopCSH or @Stopcybersexualharassment ...

Vietnam hopes to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 8 per cent a year by 2030. This is equal to about 787.4 million tonnes of carbon dioxide. Deputy Minister of Nature Resources and Environment Tran Hong Ha announced this on 12 October at a conference in Hanoi. ...

It’s a long way from Whitehall and Brussels, but a study has found that the developing country that will be hardest hit by Brexit is the south-east Asian nation of Cambodia. With the deadline to reach a Brexit agreement looming in March, much attention has been given to ...

Chiang Mai yesterday received the most undesirable accolade of becoming the most polluted city on the planet.The grim news from the IQ AirVisual air monitoring website came as authorities revealed that the situation had caused 30,000 people to go to hospital because of respiratory illnesses ...