Manufacturing
Food processing
Formosa pays $500 mil compensation for marine disaster in central Vietnam

Taiwanese company Formosa Plastics, which caused deadly marine pollution in the central region by discharging untreated effluents, has paid up the US$500 million compensation it promised to, officials said. The environment ministry said on August 31 Formosa had transferred the second half of the promised amount a ...
ASEAN trade beckons strict food safety measures

Rising income levels combined with an increase in cross-border trade in Southeast Asia has meant many countries in the region have had to begin strengthening food safety measures in order to meet growing consumer awareness. Under new food safety laws revised in July, the maximum punishment for food poisoning and ...
Shrimp grown in tanks make a splash, coming to a market near you

Americans love shrimp. We import about $5 billion worth of it from all over the globe, including from India, Thailand and Indonesia. But over the past year, we’ve learned more about the downsides of global shrimp production. The Associated Press uncovered slave labor in Southeast Asia, ...
Targeted strategies to boost exports being devised
The ministry’s International Trade Promotion Department will allocate the largest proportion of its trade-promotion budget for ASEAN markets, focusing on Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam. Malee Choklumlerd, director-general of the department, said it had been allocated a budget of Bt2 billion for the upcoming fiscal year, and ...
Vietnam dealbook: Malaysia’s Mitra Energy, Thai Union strike M&As
Malaysia’s Southeast Asia-focused oil and gas group Mitra Energy has reached a sales and purchase agreement with Japan’s Teikoku Oil to acquire a 30 per cent interest in Vietnam’s oilfields in the Nam Con Son basin. Meanwhile, Songkla Canning, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Thai Union ...
Southerners have new jobs thanks to rising levels of seawater

Sea water rise and saline intrusion have damaged crops this year, but they have offered opportunities for farmers to breed shrimp on rice fields. According to the Ca Mau provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, at first, when farmers began trying to breed shrimp, the ...
Vietnam expected to export dairy products to China
Chinese agencies have said they are considering opening the market to Vietnam dairy exports through official channels. Domestic sources reported that in the talks with the Chinese General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, the Vietnamese Minister of Industry and Trade Tran Tuan Anh requested ...
Proposed Taiwan megaproject in Ha Tinh needs PM approval

Taiwanese firm Wei Yu Engineering’s US$2.5-billion investment proposal in Ha Tinh Province must be approved by the Prime Minister, not the provincial government, said an official. Tran Tu Anh, director of Ha Tinh Department of Planning and Investment, told Dan Tri news website last week that ...
Vietnam in danger of losing shrimp export markets

Vietnamese seafood exporters are scrambling to buy raw materials to compete with Chinese businesses to fulfill export contracts. Local newspapers quoted sources as reporting that shrimp processing workshops in Mekong River Delta are now running at just 50-60 percent of capacity because of the lack of ...
Salt mine protests intensify

More than 500 villagers rallied on 12 June against a company’s underground salt mining project in Kham Thale So district amid concerns over the environmental impacts. The company is excavating to explore underground salt deposits in a location about 500 metres away from Bang Nong Hua ...