The government’s Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning (ONEP) figures show satisfactory results from measures taken to meet Thailand’s 2020 greenhouse gas reduction goal.

Yet, without additional new measures, Greenpeace country director Tara Buakamsri said,Thailand’s contribution will not be sufficient to meet the global mission to cap rising mean temperatures to the below 2-degrees Celsius limit agreed upon under the Paris Agreement.

Three years have passed since the adoption of the Paris Agreement and its targets, viewed by leading international agencies as an essential but insufficient step to curb rising carbon dioxide levels before it is too late.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) last week reported that many countries had failed to implement measures to meet the Paris commitment of a 2-degree Celsius limit, noting that additional measures beyond those in the agreement will be needed.

The panel’s special report “reveals it is ever more urgent for the global community to act now, as we need global emission to be significantly decreased by at least 45 per cent within 2030 in order to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 degree Celsius”, Tara said.

UN Environment also weighed in with its ninth Emissions Gap Report, the latest accounting of the goals and prevention efforts being made by individual countries as reported in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to fulfil the Paris Agreement’s goal.

Like the IPCC, UN Environment concluded that the current pace of global action is insufficient to meet the Paris Agreement targets.

According to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), NDCs are considered as the foundation of the Paris Agreement. They are the voluntary commitments made by each Paris Agreement signatory, and form the national goal and framework to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and pursue the climate stabilisation objective.

Though it is not alone, Thailand’s NDC commitment is too weak to effectively combat its greenhouse gas emissions, Tara cautioned. “The 2030 [greenhouse-gas reduction] target for Thailand is not very ambitious,” he said. “Under its target, it will be impossible for Thailand to achieve the benchmark of reducing the per capita emissions to below 5 tonnes of CO2 equivalent, which is needed to achieve the 2-degree Celsius target,” he said.

“Moreover, many government approved on-going projects contradict the NDC’s commitment. For example, in the latest Power Development Plan [PDP], the government maintains fossil fuels as the primary source of energy, and many new gas power plants and waste-to-energy plants are also planned in the PDP.”

In addition to an insufficient commitment by governments to seriously tackle climate change, UN Environment’s Emissions Gap Report found that the rate of global greenhouse gas emission was also rising.

Increased emissions and lagging climate actions mean the size of the emissions gap in this year’s report is larger than ever. If that trend continues, the global temperature will rise beyond 3 degrees Celsius by the end of this century, the study concluded.

UN Environment cautioned that unless governments urgently tripled their efforts to reverse the emission trend and bridged the gap, the last chance to prevent runaway climate change would be missed.

In response, Raweewon Bhuridej, secretary-general of Thailand’s Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning Office, insists that Thailand’s NDCs are a good fit for the country’s current situation. There are multiple dimensions to climate change and the government has to consider all of them, Raweewon added.

“As climate-change policies are closely implicated at every level of the economy, radical measures could disrupt economic development,” she said. “This is why the concurrent UN Climate Change Conference [COP24] in Poland is a very important event, as world leaders try to come up with the most suitable climate policy for their country.

“We have to balance environmental protection with economic development.”

She conceded that a stronger global commitment and more ambitious NDC are urgently needed to avert the impacts of climate change, adding that Thailand’s NDCs will soon be revised to strengthen climate-change prevention efforts. “As all Paris Agreement members are required to revise their NDCs once every five years in order to intensify and improve the country’s climate mitigation commitments, it will be Thailand’s turn in 2020 to propose a more ambitious greenhouse gas reduction target to UNFCCC,” she said.

The four family members, also from Myanmar, are believed to have been killed while they were sleeping on Saturday night or early yesterday morning.

This gruesome killing took place in the border province of Tak.

Mae Sot Police Station learned of the murders at about 8.30am yesterday, and found the bloodied bodies of Ador and Makhinla, both 45, inside their home. In Makhinla’s arms was the body of a four-month-old boy.

The body of the couple’s son, four-year-old Poday, was found floating in a pond nearby. Police suspect that killers might have attacked the boy and thrown his body there.

Police also found weapons at the scene – wooden bars with sharp nails.

The only family member who survived the brutal attack was 19-year-old Fah, who had spent the night at a relative’s place. Fah suspects a neighbour and his friends might have attacked her family after a quarrel erupted over noise.

“Suan and two other men were drinking near my house and they were being noisy. So, my dad asked them to quieten down as he was trying to get the baby to sleep,” Fah said.

She added that Suan and his fellow drinkers went silent for a while, but after drinking some more, they went into her house and tried to pick a fight. Though the two sides got into a big quarrel, nothing happened until the family turned in for the night.

“I think they might have broken into my house when my parents and brothers were already asleep,” she said.

Police went to Suan’s home, but he was nowhere to be found. Police have formed teams to hunt down the three suspects.

The village has unresolved overlapping claims with Khun Nan National Park on a high mountain, thus becoming uncertain about their land rights.

Since 2009, ambitions for deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions have intensified, when most of the worlds heads of state gathered at the Conference of Parties in Copenhagen (COP15), and the reduction of emissions from deforestation and forest degradation known as REDD+ has been pushed as part of the efforts to help relief climate change, including at the latest conference that ended on Friday in Poland.

For forest communities around the world, they have since prepared to do their part, only to be caught in a miasma of technicalities. No less critical is the way forests are managed nationally, which in some cases could bar them from receiving benefits that derive from their efforts.

“Whenever we had conflicts with forest officials in the past we lived in fear, because we didn’t know what we were allowed to do to make a living on our land,” said Somsak, 37. “Things have improved because now we have clearer boundaries, but the fact is that we live among protected forestland and our land rights have come in question.”

Insecurity over land rights in forested areas is among critical issues of forest governance addressed by the latest study by the Centre for People and Forests.

Overcoming that insecurity with forest governance is a critical factor if Thailand is to manage its remaining valuable forests, estimated to cover 32 per cent of all land. Of this amount, only 23 per cent is protected area.

Early this year, the centre conducted a study, applying a tool called “Enabling Environment Assessment”, developed by the environmental group WWF, which builds on the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation’s “Framework for Assessing and Monitoring Forest Governance”.

It involves assessing six elements – transparency, responsibilities, efficiency, effectiveness, equality and public participation.

According to Warangkana Rattanarat, the centre’s programme director for Thailand, in a survey of more than 100 representatives of forest communities, including those in Nan, insecurity over land rights in forest areas scored lowest, reflecting less governance. Next was public participation, which also scored relatively low.

In Nan, forests comprise more than 60 per cent of the total land area, among the highest ratio in the country.

“The implication of forest governance is it can help guarantee the success of our forest management,” Warangkana said. “In the past we lost a great deal of forest area because of poor management. Without proper management, any goals we set – including for the coming REDD+ effort – would not be achievable. Why would people invest their time and energy if they don’t have a firm hold on their land?

“In the context of climate change and reducing greenhouse gases, forest plays a critical role, but to achieve the goal we need not only to increase carbon storage,  but also find a way to sustain it. That needs good forest management, and this is why forest governance becomes critical.”

Warangkana said forest management involved three prime dimensions: policy creation and a legal framework, planning and decision-making, and implementation and enforcement. The three must be mutually reinforcing to ensure success.

The work would not succeed, for example, unless policy was turned into viable plans and properly implemented.

The current government, Warangkana said, had demonstrated good intentions and clearer policy to resolve forest problems, especially regarding the matter of overlapping land rights.

She referred to a recent Cabinet resolution affirming a proposal by the national land-policy committee to resolve the issue of overlapping rights, known as Khor Tor Chor.

Under that policy, land in forest areas where citizens’ claims overlap with those of the state would be classified and managed to different degrees, with land rights redefined.

However, she sees trouble ahead because the next steps – planning and implementation – remain problematic, prompting distrust of the intent of even good policies in some pilot areas.

“We can see acknowledgement of the long-time problems and an attempt by the state to resolve them, but fundamentally it’s participation that seems to be lacking in all processes. The state sets the course alone,” said Warangkana.

Athapol Charoenshunsa, acting chief of the Royal Forestry Department, said current policies as well as legislation are on the right track and ready to be implemented.

In the future, he conceded, state officials would need to reform themselves and work closely with citizens who have land claims, starting with a joint demarcation of their overlapping properties.

He asked back forum participants whether people are ready for change and to work with forest officials.

“This would be the future work that supports good governance,” said Athapol.

The scheme covering 526 tambon in 68 provinces is part of the government’s latest drug-abuse prevention policy.

The Drug Prevention and Suppression Office and other security agencies estimated there could be as many as 14,000 drug addicts in the 526 tambon.

Dr Pisit Sriprasert, deputy permanent secretary at the ministry, said the provincial offices had three months to complete the work.

Addicts would be sent to community public health units for treatment under a concept called “Community Based Treatment and Care”, he said.

“Drug addicts are sick people and need help and medical care,” Pisit said.

“It’s not just about drug addiction – social conditions and the environment also play roles. They need support, and once treated they can return to society and live normal lives and contribute to society like other people. Society should give them a chance.”

Dr Mahathir was awarded the doctorate for leadership in social, business and politics by university president Dr Arthit Ourairat during its convocation ceremony here.

The Rangsit University Hall, with 5,000 graduates, was adorned with fresh flowers while the stage, complete with an altar for the Thai King, was full of traditional ornamentation.

The conferment ceremony was steeped in Thai customs.

The university’s orchestra also rendered a special song titled “Blessings from the Sky”, which had been composed specially for Dr Mahathir.

In his acceptance speech on Sunday (Dec 16), Dr Mahathir highlighted how students are future leaders who can also help maintain relations among Asean countries.

Dr Arthit praised Dr Mahathir for being a leader who returned from retirement to save Malaysia from being destroyed by corruption and greed, and also as someone who bravely speaks up for those countries which are unable to do so.