Environment and natural resources

Air pollution has blanketed Bangkok and most of Thailand again this month. As expected, the government has responded with the usual raft of contingency measures, but nothing to address the problem at its root.The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration’s prototype air purifier which was installed in the ...

Southeast Asian countries, among the world’s worst ocean polluters, need tougher regulations for plastic packaging to curb leakage, a UN report said on Wednesday.Southeast Asia is a major contributor to land-based plastic waste leaking into the world’s oceans, with more than half of it coming ...

The cabinet has given the greenlight to a “No Plastic” campaign which will start on Jan 1 next year ahead of a ban on single-use plastic bags in 2021.Speaking after the cabinet meeting in Kanchanaburi on Tuesday, Government spokeswoman Narumon Pinyosinwat said the cabinet has ...

From krathong made from banana leaves to those made of styrofoam, bread, ice and other biodegradables, Thais have come up with many different ideas and materials to make floats for the Loy Krathong Festival, during which, on every Full Moon of the 12th lunar month, ...

In the last few years, Thai people have made more of an effort to help protect the environment, especially during the annual Loy Krathong festival, with many floating baskets now being made from natural and biodegradable materials, instead of plastic or Styrofoam which had previously ...

Plastic is today a major part of our convenient, throwaway lifestyles.Since the beginning of mass production in the 1940s, plastics have become almost unavoidable in daily life. But what was once a symbol of convenience now evokes images of overflowing rubbish dumps, oceans saturated with ...

Illegal hunting poses a greater threat to ASEAN’s wildlife than earlier thought according to a study published in the Communications Biology journal last week. The research in three ASEAN countries showed that maintaining habitat quality as a means of protecting tropical biodiversity is, by itself, ...

Rising seas could affect three times more people by 2050 than previously thought, according to new research, threatening to all but erase some of the world’s great coastal cities including Bangkok.The authors of a paper published this week developed a more accurate way of calculating ...

The Mekong River is possibly the most important waterway in Southeast Asia. It feeds 60 million people in six countries and there have been long-standing concerns that China is trying to control it. China recently halted plans in March to blast rapids along the river ...

The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) and Unilever Thailand have signed a memorandum of understanding to run the Tourism to Recycling Actions for the Schools and Homes (Trash) project, starting in Krabi province.Other parties, including the Pollution Control Department and Krabi municipality, will join the ...