News
MRC countries agree to collectively manage drought
The Mekong River Commission Council yesterday approved a five-year strategy until 2025 which allows Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam to prepare for and manage drought collectively. The approval comes as the MRC’s preliminary data analysis shows that severe to extreme drought is expected to hit countries ...
Pech Sotheary
Dams and Climate Change Kill the Mekong
The swirling currents of the once mighty Mekong, shrunk by drought and increasingly crippled by dams point towards an unprecedented crisis of water governance along the more than 4,900 kilometers of southeast Asia’s longest river. “This is the worst ecological disaster in history of the Mekong,” declared ...
Tom Fawthrop
7kg plastic waste found in dead wild deer
The stomach of a wild deer discovered dead in the Khun Sathan National Park in northern Nan province was found to contain seven kilogrammes of plastic waste, along with underwear. The office of the national park reported on Monday that park rangers found the adult deer ...
Apinya Wipatayotin
Environment Minister looks to curb land encroachment
Environment Minister Say Samal has urged authorities in three provinces to prevent illegal land encroachment in the Samlot multi-purpose-use area and Phnom Samkos Wildlife Sanctuary as both areas are suffering from illegal occupations. Mr Samal issued the order over the weekend in meetings with officials from ...
Pech Sotheary
HCM City, Mekong Delta face serious land subsidence
Land subsidence in Ho Chi Minh City and the Mekong Delta has ranged from 0.1 to 81 centimetres in the last 10 years, according to the Water Resources Management Department at the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment. The figure was reported at a conference on ...
NASA space data can cut disaster response times, costs
According to a new study, emergency responders could cut costs and save time by using near-real-time satellite data along with other decision-making tools after a flooding disaster. In the first NASA study to calculate the value of using satellite data in disaster scenarios, researchers at NASA’s Goddard Space ...
Jessica Merzdorf
Illegal timber and vehicles seized in three provinces
Forestry administration and other related authorities seized a large amount of illegal timber and a number of vehicles, including boats, used for transporting timber. Kratie province’s Sambor district Military Police commander Sum Sokunthea told The Post on Sunday that anti-natural resource crime forces had patrolled the ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
Course organisers assess scheme to provide rural women with job skills
The Lao Women’s Union and the Republic of Korea’s Ministry of Gender Equality and Family have joined forces to provide vocational training for Lao women, to improve their job prospects. A meeting to discuss the management of the project took place on Friday at the Lao ...
Vientiane Vision 2.0 Puts Japan’s Asia Security Role into Focus
One of the significant but under noticed developments at this year’s ASEAN Defense Ministers’ Meeting-related (ADMM) meetings in Bangkok was Japan’s launching of a sequel to its defense initiative for Southeast Asian states, termed Vientiane Vision 2.0. The development once again put the focus on ...
Prashanth Parameswaran
China’s dam-building programme must take neighbours into account
The building of large dams has increasingly run into opposition in established democracies but gained momentum in autocratic states, which often tout their benefits for combating droughts and water shortages. But, as the Mekong basin illustrates, giant upstream dams can contribute to river depletion and ...
Brahma Chellaney