Showing 1 - 10 of 20
Clock ticks as plastic talks drag on
Oped, Pichmol Rugrod, Published on 13/08/2025
» This week in Geneva, negotiators from around the world are gathered for the fifth session of the Global Plastics Treaty -- known as INC 5.2. It is an intergovernmental process aimed at finding solutions to the plastic pollution crisis. Yet, more than a week in, progress toward a strong and binding agreement remains painfully slow. As the clock ticks, our window to act is rapidly closing.
Thailand's export-led model needs rejig
Oped, Pavida Pananond, Published on 03/07/2025
» Time is running out for Thailand, and the stakes have never been higher. As Finance Minister Pichai Chunhavajira arrived in Washington this week for critical trade talks with the US negotiation team, Thailand confronts not just a tariff negotiation but an existential challenge to its export-dependent economic model. With US President Donald Trump's 90-day grace period expiring on July 8, Thailand must secure a deal or face a punishing 36% tariff that threatens to unravel decades of export-led development strategy.
Tariff chaos could halt 80 years of economic progress
Oped, Anne O. Krueger, Published on 26/04/2025
» International trade and exploration have captivated the human imagination for millennia. From Alexander the Great to Marco Polo, from the Silk Road to the East India Company, history is filled with examples of commerce redrawing the map of the known world. But for much of history, trade was shaped more by power than by fairness.
Global South will pay for trade war
Oped, Jayati Ghosh, Published on 22/04/2025
» US President Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs have unleashed economic chaos, roiling stock and bond markets and triggering panic around the world, especially in lower-income countries that rely heavily on exports to the United States. The result could be an entirely manufactured global recession, with the developing world bearing the brunt.
Clearer policy on Myanmar is needed
Oped, Vitit Muntarbhorn, Published on 18/04/2025
» Regrettably, the recent earthquake in Myanmar compounds the longstanding pain and suffering inflicted on the people of the country due to authoritarianism and human rights violations. Can such a catastrophe also be a catalyst for transformative, constructive change?
Hope dies in Thailand's broken system
Oped, Sanitsuda Ekachai, Published on 28/02/2025
» A woman, stunned, her husband holding her hand as she walks down the courthouse stairs. Prof Pirongrong Ramasoota, a respected scholar and commissioner of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), has been sentenced to two years in jail. Her crime? Having a dispute with a corporate giant during her work as a state media regulator.
Gold isn't everything
Oped, Postbag, Published on 15/08/2024
» Re: "Nation ranks 44th at Games: 3rd in Asean", (BP, Aug 13).
Credit ratings and climate chaos
Oped, Emily Wilkinson & Kanni Wignaraja, Published on 13/12/2023
» The sun-drenched coral islands and reefs of the Maldives are in existential danger. With 80% of the country's population living just one metre above sea level, many islands could become uninhabitable as climate change causes the ocean's level to rise. By the end of this century, half a million people could be displaced. The Maldives is confronting this threat with a range of innovative adaptation initiatives, from restoring coral reefs to floating solar-power systems. But survival does not come cheap.
Time runs short in India's climate crisis
Oped, Imran Khalid, Published on 09/08/2023
» 'I have never seen climate carnage on the scale of the floods here in Pakistan. As our planet continues to warm, all countries will increasingly suffer losses and damage from climate beyond their capacity to adapt. This is a global crisis, it demands a global response," wrote UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in his tweet at the end of his two-day solidarity trip to Pakistan in September last year.
Potash mine govt's fault
Oped, Editorial, Published on 21/07/2023
» A recent report by a research institute into pollution from a potash mining site in Nakhon Ratchasima has confirmed the worst fears of local residents in Dan Khun Thot district. They have been protesting against the mine for years out of fear it will contaminate the area's water sources and arable farmland.