News
ASEAN and the EEU: close to free trade zone?
ASEAN and EEU member countries are estimated to have a combined GDP of $3.5 trillion and a combined population of over 700 million. On August 5, Russian media outlets quoted Russian Minister of Economic Development Alexei Ulyukayev as saying that an agreement had been reached ...
World Bank loan will not be used for govt salary increases, says president’s office spokesperson
Government employees’ salaries will not increase despite plans to take out a loan worth US$100 million from the World Bank, aimed at covering a state deficit by separating salaries from the budget, according to government officials. Myanmar’s President Htin Kyaw sent a message on August 5 ...
Mesco closes in on gold licence
After an unexpectedly lengthy review, the Ministry of Environment has approved the environmental and social impact study of Indian mining firm Mesco Gold, clearing the last major hurdle for the company to receive a licence to operate the Kingdom’s first royalty-generating mine. “The Ministry of Environment ...
$120-million plant faces closure after mass fish deaths in Vietnam
The plant will only return to operations when environmental issues have been resolved. A soda ash manufacturer in the central province of Quang Nam has been reportedly killing fish for a year, and air and noise pollution caused by the plant has affected more than 400 ...
GMS cross-border pact on hold
Though all countries in the Greater Mekong Sub-region had signed a cross-border trade agreement 14 years ago to enhance the sub-region’s economic connectivity, the CBTA, however, is yet to be ratified in individual Mekong nations for its full implementation. This was revealed last week by ...
Monster sugar mill eats through sugarcane supply
Just three months since starting production, Cambodia’s largest sugar mill is sitting idle due to a shortage of its primary input sugarcane, a provincial Agriculture Ministry official said on August 7. Poeung Trida, director of the Preah Vihear Agricultural Department, said Rui Feng (Cambodia) International Company’s ...
Certification ‘key’ to better forest management
Laos and Indonesia’s keen efforts to certify their logging industries have paved the way for access to wider markets, better timber prices, and less deforestation and illegal logging. Six timber-processing businesses in Laos have been certified and five million hectares of plantation forest has been certified ...
Vietnam risks facing severe labour shortages
Government and business leaders speaking at a recent forum in Ho Chi Minh City have said that Vietnam is at risk of running out of skilled machinists and other manufacturing workers over the next four to five years. At the conference sponsored by the HCM City ...
China's 5 year plan for energy
China’s 13th Five-Year Plan for energy might be one of the most anticipated official documents in the world and is one that will have far-reaching impacts on the carbon trajectory of the world’s number one emitter. Recently, information about the plan begins to surface in the Chinese ...
Miles to go
Though foreign investment is soaring and GDP is expected to grow by at least 8% this year and next, both are from a tiny base. Before the army seized power, Myanmar had been one of the world’s leading rice exporters and one of Asia’s wealthiest ...
