News

On September 30, Myanmar announced a record 946 COVID-19 cases in a single day. Less noticed was that it also performed a record number of lab tests – 6,262, to be exact. As cases have increased, particularly in Yangon, numbers like this have quickly become the ...

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is assisting the government of Thailand in designing, issuing and monitoring innovative capital market initiatives as part of the country’s recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic in a manner aligned with the 2015 Paris Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals. ADB’s ...

With the general election only weeks away – notwithstanding the potential impact of the second wave of COVID-19 – political parties are flooding social media with pledges and promises to woo voters. For the National League for Democracy, the November 8 election poses a new challenge: ...

Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Tran Hong Ha, on behalf of the Vietnamese Government, has called on countries to combine strength and coordinate actions in a more urgent, drastic and practical manner to protect biodiversity – a priceless natural resource. Ha made the appeal at ...

Parametric and index-based disaster risk transfer company, Global Parametrics (GP), has announced its support for the AGRIBEE Crop Insurance Pilot to provide extreme weather protection cover for smallholder rice farmers in Cambodia. GP is providing cover for the transaction from its Natural Disaster Fund (NDF). Through ...

The Mekong River in Southeast Asia flows for 4,350 kilometers from China to Vietnam through Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Cambodia. China’s construction of large hydropower dams to feed the country’s growing energy needs is causing problems downriver, including dire impacts on the waters and fertile ...

Thao Nguyen Phan’s Becoming Alluvium opens with sound: an outboard motor puttering in the dark. The tea-brown, silt-clouded water of the Mekong appears, gliding beneath the prow of a little boat. Lines from the great poet Rabindranath Tagore’s The Gardener lap the screen, concluding: “Why did the ...

Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) have requested that the Ministry of Environment to publicly release the full details of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) to ensure accountability and transparency of environmental governance in Cambodia. The request was made in the workshop on “Using Open EIA Reporting to ...

Despite fears to the contrary among those in favour of it, the ban on paraquat and chlorpyrifos is to remain in place. The Hazardous Substances Committee has confirmed that production, possession, and importing or exporting either substance remains illegal, under legislation introduced on June 1 of this ...

Households in eight villages surrounding the Beung Kiat Ngong (BKN) Ramsar Wetland in Pathoumphone district, Champassak province, are benefitting from the Lower Mekong Basin Wetland Management and Conservation Project at the BKN Ramsar Site. The project works to improve livelihoods and provide jobs in local communities, ...