China plans first 1 mln kw air-cooling systems at clean-coal plants

China will be the first country to install million-kilowatt (kw) air-cooling systems in ultra-supercritical coal-fired power plants, Xinhua news agency reported.

The cooling facilities, which were entirely domestically designed and built, will be part of the Huadian Lingwu power plant project, located in the northwestern coal-rich and arid Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.

The project will have two ultra super-critical generating units of 1 million kw each, which will start up around 2011, Xinhua reported, citing an official with the China Huadian Corp. China Huadian is a state-owned power generation company.

Using this cooling technique will save an estimated 70 percent of the water that would have been used in conventional water-cooled power units. In this case, it means 24 million tones of water annually, enough for the consumption of nearly 800,000 people for a year, according to Xinhua.-

Cambodia-Thailand border trade returns to normal

Phnom Penh (VNA) – Import and export activities at cross border areas between Cambodia and Thailand have returned normal after the latter lifted the ban on import of farm produce from Cambodia.

Between 200 and 300 vehicles from Thailand had entered Cambodia to transport exported farm produce, mainly maize and beans, to Thailand, according to officials at the border areas.

Meanwhile, Cambodia’s imports of steel, cement and other essential goods from Thailand have also taken place normally in the Pailin area.-

Cambodian men sentenced for bombing attempt

Phnom Penh (VNA) – Five Cambodian men were sentenced to between 15 and 17 years in prison by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court for their role in an attempt to blow up the Cambodia-Vietnam Friendship Monument.

Sok Kim Sovath and Kim Toeun, who were found guilty of committing terrorist acts and illegally using explosives, each received 17 years in jail.

The remaining three men, namely Soeung Hang, Soeung Vy and Lum Phen, were each sentenced to 15 years in prison on charge of taking part in terrorist activities.

All the five were accused of planting explosive devices around the monument on July 29 last year.-

Indochina to boost tourism at border triangle

Phnom Penh (VNA) – Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia have agreed to boost tourism development projects in 10 provinces in the three countries’ economic development triangle.

At a recent meeting in Phnom Penh, the tourism ministries of the three countries also agreed to conduct joint surveys on tourism development potential and foreign direct investment attraction capacities in provinces of Ratanakiri, Mondolkiri and Stung Treng of Cambodia; Atopu, Sekong and Saravan of Laos; and Gia lai, Kon Tum, Dak Lak and Dak Nong of Vietnam.

The tripartite agreement also outlined that ministries will propose their governments to approve projects related to immigration control and tourism infrastructure construction at those provinces.

Cambodian tourism ministry is projected to submit its government a project to build a road segment running from Krache province to Vietnam’s border areas via Mondolkiri province.

A book of 148 pages introducing famous tourist sites at the border triangle of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia will also be published in the coming time, according to the agreement.-

Thailand, Malaysia to combat sex trafficking

Hanoi (VNA) - Thai and Malaysian police will take joint action to combat the cross-border trade in involuntary sex workers between the two neighbouring countries.

This was highlighted at a joint seminar entitled ”Save Our Daughters” in Songkhla to adopt joint measures for the Thai and Malaysian police to combat forced prostitution along the common border, reported Nam News Network.

Information pertaining to the trafficking underworld will be exchanged by the two sides, and witness protection programmes will be provided, the news network said.

Areas where prostitution had intensified over the past several years include Betong, Sugai Kolok, Sadao and Hat Yai in Thailand as well as seven states inside Malaysia.

Some 532 children and women in the region were reported to be lured or forced into prostitution during the past several years with 489 of them being Thai while others, Cambodian, Lao, Myanmar and Vietnamese.-

Mekong river’s water level in Thailand hit peak in 30 years

Heavy rains and flooding have caused the water level of Mekong river that runs through Thailand’s northeastern provinces to rise to 12.6 m, the highest peak over the past 30 years.

The high water level overflowed the river banks, forcing thousands of households to evacuate and schools to close, and affecting crops. In Nong Khai province bordering Laos , many roads and structures were partially under water after heavy rains lashed the area on August 14 night, damaging at least 400 homes in Pak Khat district.

An initial survey found that about 128,180 people were affected by flood in Nakhon Phanom province. Traffic on several hundred roads was disrupted, seven dikes were damaged, thousands of hectares of farmland went under water and over 1,200 commercial fishponds were affected. Damage has been estimated at 193.8 million baht (5.73 million USD), according to Thai News Agency (TNA).

Thai Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Kowit Watana made a field trip of the submerged areas to monitor evacuation and relief activities.

Besides, the Health Ministry sent medicines and medical instruments to natural disaster-hit localities.-

Malaysia set to resort to renewable energy

The Malaysian government is to promote the use of renewal sources of energy as one of the strategies to mitigate the impact of the energy crisis and solar photovoltaic (PV) energy has been identified as one of them.

Energy, Water and Communications Minister Shaziman Abu Mansor said on August 14 that his ministry would consider a feed-in tariff mechanism as part of the drive to promote the widespread use of renewable energy, especially solar energy, in the country, Malaysia ’s Bernama news agency reported.

“The feed-in tariff will provide the opportunity for owners to install solar PV and generate clean electricity and the home and building owners can then sell the (excess) solar electricity to the power utility at a much higher price than the retail tariff rate,” the Minister was quoted as saying.

He said the government needed to consider a cost-effective mechanism which would facilitate the growth of the solar PV market in Malaysia and to bring down prices but did not elaborate on the effective mechanism that would be implemented.-

Indonesia allocates 24.7 bln USD to subsides in 2009

The Indonesian government will allocate 227.2 trillion rupiah (24.7 billion USD) or 27.8 percent of its expenditures in the 2009 State Budget to subsidies, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said.

The amounts to be spent on various subsidies in the 2009 Draft State Budget would be 101.4 trillion rupiah for fuel oil, 60.4 trillion rupiah for electricity and 60.4 trillion rupiah for food, fertilizer and seedlings, Antara news agency reported, citing President Yudhoyono’s State-of-the-Nation address at a House of Representatives (DPR) plenary session on August 15.

“The government indeed is committed to maintaining economic stability by controlling the prices of fuel oil and the basic electricity tariff,” he said.

The government, however, would continue to amend the subsidy policy in order to reduce budget leakages, prevent misdirection, and to evaluate the subsidy budget based on current developments in the global oil price, the President added.-

Forest owners find benefits in protecting trees

— Vietnamese forest owners can get money from the huge industrial bosses of the world, under a mechanism in which carbon providers pay forest owners.

Late last month, Vietnam was selected as one of 14 countries in the world to apply the mechanism to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD).

Nepal, Laos, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Guyana, Mexico and Panama were also selected.

Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF), an innovative approach to financing efforts to combat climate change, aims to achieve REDD by compensating developing countries for greenhouse gas emission reductions. Meanwhile, the industrialised countries, which include Australia, Finland, France, Japan, Norway, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States, have committed to contribute about 82 million USD to the FCPF.

Vuong Van Quynh, who will be in Ghana to represent Vietnam in discussions with the United Nations about applying REDD in the country, has high hopes for the mechanism.

He says forest destruction will be reduced when forest owners, meaning the local people, can be prevented from destroying them if they’re paid enough to support their lives.

Quynh says some of the owners are so poor that they are forced to burn the forest to plant crops, or work with illegal timber loggers, even though they understand it is not good for their future.

Some environmental experts have also emphasised that the money the forest-rich nations receive is not charity. It is simply the responsibility of industrial nations who have caused and continue to cause the pollution that is killing the earth. Protectors of forests which convert billions of tonnes of carbon into oxy- gen, are now to be paid for doing so.

While discussions of REDD continue, in order to protect its 12.7 million ha of forest, Vietnam will carry out a pilot programme of payment in the provinces of Son La and Lam Dong next year before expanding nationwide.

The costs will be covered by the people, especially producers whose factories emit carbon and tourists who get to enjoy nature.-

Firms respond to PM rice mandate

Workers load bags of rice at the Southern Food Company. Businesses are now buying up rice after instructions from the Prime Minister. — VNA/VNS Photo Dinh Hue

HCM CITY — Business members of the Viet Nam Food Association (VFA) have been actively purchasing rice from Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta in the last few days, at an average of 10,000 tonnes per day, the association said on Wednesday.

The purchases are in response to the Prime Minister’s instructions to help farmers unload all their commercial rice harvested from the bumper summer-autumn crop.

The VFA expects that the volume will soon rise to 20,000 tonnes of rice daily, at a price of around VND5 million per tonne.

August purchases by VFA businesses are expected to reach 640,000 tonnes, or 730,000 tonnes including private businesses.

The People’s Committee of Dong Thap Province has asked the State Bank of Viet Nam’s branch in the province to direct commercial banks in Dong Thap to offer enough loans to enterprises wanting to purchase rice from farmers.

The banks should consider extending loan payment deadlines, and providing new loans for farmers who have not yet sold all their rice, said the committee.

The committee has also asked the Dong Thap Food Company and Docimexco JSC to buy up the entire stock of rice from farmers in the province.

The price of rice has risen slightly following the Prime Minister’s directive to food companies to buy excess supplies of the summer-autumn rice crop.

Prices range between VND4,200-4,400 per kg in Dong Thap Province.

The VFA said paddy prices now stand at VND3,500-5,500 a kg, an increase of VND100-200 over last weekend.

Nguyen Van Dong, director of Hau Giang Province’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, said traders were buying rice at VND4,300-4,400 a kg compared to VND4,000-4,100 a kg last week.

In Can Tho City, rice price rose to VND4,400-4,500 a kg, an increase of VND100-200 a kg against last weekend.

An Giang Province has also proposed buying an additional 200,000 tonnes of rice for national reserves.

Dong said the Hau Giang Province Food Company has bought 5,000 tonnes of rice from farmers.

Ha Van Loi, deputy director of the Hau Thanh Dong wholesale market in Long An Province, said the market had been told to purchase 6,000 tonnes of rice.

At present, the VFA is accelerating rice delivery to finish the shipment of 3.6 million tonnes under contracts for August and September. The association has not yet signed new contracts because rice prices in the world market are lower.

By the end of July, Viet Nam exported 2.8 million tonnes of rice, earning $1.8 billion, said Nguyen Thanh Bien, deputy minister of industry and trade.

The export volume declined by 7 per cent over the same period but the export value increased by nearly 90 per cent.

Bien said relevant offices are considering cutting tax rates for export rice and the rates will be adjusted as needed.

Viet Nam targets to export 4.5-4.6 million tonnes of rice this year. —