Nikkei Asian Review

New Thai government must show more responsibility with the Mekong

Around this time of year when the rainy season begins, people living on the banks of the Mekong River along the Thai-Lao border always feel a little less stressed because rising water levels mean more fish and food to support their survival. Until the mid-1990s, these ...

Titipol Phakdeewanich

Myanmar seeks Russian assistance in push for nuclear energy

Myanmar is pursuing greater economic cooperation with Russia including on nuclear energy, as U.S. and European sanctions increasingly isolate them from the rest of the world. Myanmar leader Sen. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing on July 11 met with Alexey Likhachev, director general of Russian state energy ...

Nikkei staff writers

Thailand taps rice, sugar biomass to wean itself from fossil fuels

Thailand has launched a full-fledged effort to adopt biomass as a major future energy source, a drive that has received a boost from companies looking for relief from skyrocketing fossil fuel prices. Thailand took up the bio-circular-green economic model a year ago as a way to ...

YOHEI MURAMATSU, Nikkei staff writer

OPINION: Thai agriculture needs reform from ground up

Thailand’s government badly wants the middle-income country to achieve advanced economy status. But it will fail unless it raises agricultural productivity and upskills rural workers for jobs in more productive sectors. This will demand hitherto unseen political commitment. For decades, political leaders have paid lip service ...

Craig Keating

Asia swaps coal for wood fuel, but emissions still a threat

The rebuke of coal has pushed countries like South Korea and Japan to embrace the harvesting of trees to be processed into wood pellets, but environmentalists are warning that this fuel might prove as damaging as the black mineral it is replacing. Some critics focus on ...

LIEN HOANG

Vietnam promotes Can Tho to special city, focusing on Mekong Delta

Vietnam is granting Can Tho, on the Mekong Delta, a special status to draw investment amid China’s growing presence in the country and the South China Sea. The National Assembly approved the plan to promote the southern city on Tuesday. With this resolution, Hanoi will grant ...

TOMOYA ONISHI, Nikkei staff writer

Thailand pushes dream of 'land bridge' to boost economy

The dream of a Thai land bridge, a transport route that would cross the Malay Peninsula to connect ports on either side, has surfaced again in Thailand. If it becomes a reality, a land bridge could cut shipping times by about two days, compared with ...

YOHEI MURAMATSU, Nikkei staff writer

Washington gets serious about the Mekong

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris launched a mission impossible this week to restore her country’s shaky credibility as a trusted ally. “The reason I am here is because the United States is a global leader, and we take that role seriously,” a straight-faced Harris said on her ...

Kavi Chongkittavorn

Why we should care about fate of the Mekong

The Mekong River is Southeast Asia’s beating heart, coursing almost 5,000 km through China, where it is known as the Lancang River, and onward through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and Cambodia before entering Vietnam and flowing into the sea. More than 70 million people rely on the ...

An Pich Hatda

A wake-up call to Asia, tackle your own 'Asian hate'

For expatriates like me, an unexpected upside to life in Bangkok during the COVID-19 outbreak is that it has become significantly easier to hail a taxi. Before the pandemic, drivers would often ignore me or try to rip me off, thinking I was among the millions of ...

YUKAKO ONO

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