News
SE Asia’s COVID legacy is less wildlife trade, but more hunting, study finds
The COVID-19 pandemic, which began spreading in a seafood and poultry market in Wuhan, China, shone a spotlight on zoonotic diseases and the risks that markets selling wild meat can pose to human health. Following the outbreak, some countries like China temporarily closed down wet markets, while ...
Spoorthy Raman
Strong northeast monsoon winds could bring salinity to Mekong Delta
Additionally, strong operation of the northeast monsoon winds also can bring salinity at a depth of 50-65 kilometers, affecting water intake from the sluices. According to the latest news from the Southern Institute of Water Resources Research on March 3, the largest saltwater intrusion at the ...
Vinh Tuong- Translated by Huyen Huong
The vanishing catch: How women are suffering in the Mekong Delta
Fishing is what used to keep Nguyễn Thị Nga’s family afloat during the Mekong Delta’s flood season in the southern province of An Giang. “We always filled buckets with fish, but now there are very few,” said the 44-year-old woman with a sigh. Money earned from ...
Vân Nguyễn
Vietnam gets foreign financial backing for decarbonization effort
Three financial institutions in Japan, the United States and Australia have announced that they will support Vietnam’s decarbonization effort. The institutions, backed by the governments of the countries mentioned above, would help Vietnam transition into liquefied natural gas plants and step up renewable energy utilization and ...
The Saigon Times
Climate of fear engulfs Vietnam’s mainstream media
A fear-cloaked dynamic has increasingly percolated Vietnam’s information environment, in both cyberspace and the mainstream media. A decree guiding the controversial Cybersecurity Law, which took effect in October 2022, looks to further empower Vietnamese authorities to censor online content they disfavour and bolster the state’s digital surveillance ...
Dien Luong, ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute
Salinity arrives sooner than expected in Mekong Delta
Locals in Ben Tre Province are storing freshwater as saltwater intrudes into canals and rivers at levels higher than seen in previous years. Last weekend, Vo Thi Ngoc Anh, 50, a resident in Binh Dai District of Ben Tre, switched to bottled water for cooking instead ...
Hoang Nam
How the race for a Covid vaccine enriched monkey poachers and endangered macaques
Gary Tucker was attending a conference on monkeys used in medical research when he spotted some uninvited guests: agents with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. As they walked in and out of the Colorado hotel, Tucker, an executive at a monkey import company, hid in ...
Rich Schapiro, Anna Schecter, Andrew W. Lehren and Anton L. Delgado
Erosion continues to destroy Mekong Delta homes
A dozen homes and adjacent fruit farms and fishponds were swept away into a river in Vinh Long Province recently, which is just another episode of destructive erosion in the Mekong Delta. Erosion swallowed up much of the banks of the Chien River on Monday afternoon, ...
Cuu Long
Ho Chi Minh City’s plastic ‘habit’ leaves piles of waste
Kieu Anh Tran heads down a small alley to her workshop in Ho Chi Minh City’s Binh Thanh District. Inside, her team is busy washing used plastic tarpaulins, cutting patterns, and sewing the discarded material into backpacks, tote bags, and wallets. In Vietnam’s southern city and ...
Govi Snell
Elderly fleeing Mekong Delta as climate change hits
HO CHI MINH CITY, VIETNAM – At 63, Nguyen Thi Ngoc landed her first full-time ‘company’ job as a security guard in Ho Chi Minh City. She had never been to a city before taking the job in early 2021, but the former farmer from ...
Nhung Nguyen