A special Chinese documentary and culture festival was held at Bangkok’s China Cultural Centre on Tuesday to strengthen Thai-Chinese relations.
The event featured Chinese documentary films and culture, including a guzheng (the Chinese plucked zither) on display, a documentary on Sanxingdui, a key archaeological site in Sichuan, as well as scrumptious Chinese fare for visitors to taste, with students especially enjoying a variety of freshly made food.
Meanwhile, several photos to mark the 10th anniversary of the cultural centre’s establishment were exhibited.
Chinese Ambassador Han Zhiqiang said the event aims to promote cooperation between China and Thailand in arts and culture, as well as enable a new generation of Thai students to get to know more about China.
He said the cultural exchange between the two nations is “going well”, thanks to support from their leaders.
“We hope that cultural exchanges and mutual learning will play an important role in strengthening the relationship between the two countries,” he added.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha’s wife Naraporn Chan-o-cha praised the China Cultural Centre’s role in cementing ties over the past ten years.
She also hoped there would be increased cooperation in arts and culture in the future.
Eight provinces in the North and Central region are at risk of flooding on Thursday, while a host of others could see some areas inundated because of rising sea levels, the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation said.
The eight are Phichit, Sukhothai, Phitsalulok and Phetchabun in the North and Chanthaburi, Trat, Ang Thong and Ayutthaya in the central region.
In a Facebook post, the department advised residents in these eight provinces to follow updates from government agencies, take care while driving and beware of poisonous creatures or electrical shock.
The department also said the following provinces may be flooded due to rising sea levels:
The special economic crisis management committee will on Thursday consider additional measures to help lower electricity costs, Finance Minister Arkhom Termpittayapaisith said on Wednesday.
He said the measures would be added to those by the ministry to reduce the cost of living. One of the ministry’s main measures is the fifth phase of the “Khon La Khrueng” (Let’s Go Halves) co-shopping subsidy scheme, which will run from September 1 to October 31.
Meanwhile, ministry permanent secretary Krisada Chinavicharana said the committee, chaired by Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, would also seek solutions to the economic crisis.
He said the committee had prepared a plan to tackle the crisis in both the short and long terms.
“The committee will consider whether there is anything that needs to be dealt with,” Krisada said.
According to him, the economic situation has seen an improvement, but the issue of electricity tariffs still needs looking into.
The State Railway of Thailand (SRT) has introduced two more trains on the Bangkok-Padang Besar route and vice versa starting from Thursday (August 11) to facilitate travellers who wish to visit Malaysia.
They are:
1. Express Train 45, departing from Bangkok at 3.10pm and arriving in Padang Besar at 9.50am (Thailand time).
2. Express Train 46, departing from Padang Besar at 5.06pm (Thailand time) and arriving in Bangkok at 12.45am.
SRT Public Relations Centre director Ekarat Sriarayanphong said the move aims to promote tourism in the southern region and attract tourists from Malaysia after the Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration eased travel restrictions at Thai-Malaysian borders.
Ekarat said with the addition of the two trains, SRT now operates a total of 200 trains per day – 36 on northern routes, 46 on northeastern, 52 on southern, 24 on eastern, 34 on Mahachai routes and eight on Mae Klong routes.
On July 15, the SRT added four trains to its Hat Yai-Padang Besar routes to make it more convenient for travellers in Hat Yai to visit Malaysia.
They are:
1. Train 947, Hat Yai-Padang Besar (departing at 7.30am, arriving at 8.25am)
From September 5, backseat passengers of vehicles with not more than 7 seats will be required to wear seat belts.
Metropolitan Police deputy chief Pol Maj-General Jirasan Kaewsaeng-Ake said on Wednesday that the 13th amendment to the Land Traffic Act of 1879 will take effect next month, expanding the compulsory use of seat belts to include passengers in the front seats and backseats.
He said old vehicles registered before January 1, 1988, will be exempted from the new rule as the backseats cannot be fitted with seat belts.
“In the early phase, police officers will focus on issuing a warning to those who are not yet aware of the new rules. Fining of violators [at a maximum 2,000 baht] will be considered on case-by-case basis,” said Jirasan.
The 13th amendment of the act also added two new clauses: A) children under six years must use a car seat or a specialised seat to prevent injuries in case of an accident, and B) passengers who are under 135cm tall must wear a seat belt or use a specialised seat to prevent injuries in case of a mishap.
These two new rules are also scheduled to take effect on September 5. However, Jirasan said they could be postponed for a maximum 90 days as the details and specifications of car seats are yet to be finalised and announced by the Royal Thai Police.
The Public Health Ministry reported on Thursday (August 11) that over the past 24 hours, 2,316 Covid-19 patients have been admitted to hospitals.
The death toll has risen by 35, while 2,076 patients have recovered and discharged from hospitals.
The number of cumulative cases in the country since January 1, 2022, stands at 2,390,622 with 10,032 deaths.
The country’s total caseload from Covid-19 stands at 4,614,057 – 4,561,023 of whom have recovered, 21,304 are still in hospitals and 31,730 have died.
Separately, another 4,924 people were given their first Covid-19 shot in the last 24 hours, 7,872 their second shot and 34,003 a booster, bringing the total number of Covid-19 vaccine doses administered nationwide to 142,056,749.
According to Worldometer, confirmed cases globally had risen to 592.52 million on Thursday, 564.37 million of whom have recovered, 21.7 million are active cases (44,176 in severe condition) and 6.45 million have died (up by 2,044).
Thailand ranks 28th in the global list of most cases, which is topped by the US with 94.35 million, followed by India with 44.21 million, Brazil with 34.14 million, France with 34.1 million and Germany with 31.44 million.
The search for people missing after Monday’s record-breaking downpour in Seoul and its surrounding areas continues, with seven people still unaccounted for as of 6am on Wednesday. Nine have been confirmed dead, and hundreds remain displaced.
Abrother and sister are reported to have been swept into a manhole, when the lid suddenly opened due to a countercurrent.
One missing person disappeared after being swept away by rapid currents while checking on his vehicle in an underground parking lot. A witness reported the incident immediately, and the fire department began searching at 11pm on Monday, but he is yet to be found. Another man went missing in a similar way near another underground parking lot.
Three people are reported missing from Gyeonggi province.
In Gwangju, two people were swept away by a flooded river, and in Namyangju, a teenager disappeared on her way home, swept away by a rapid stream.
Nine people in Seoul and surrounding areas died from house flooding, electrocutions, landslides, and a bus station collapse.
Four victims drowned in two semi-basement homes in Seoul, including a family of three in one and a middle-aged woman in another.
The authorities said that fatalities from the downpour could rise as the clean-up of affected areas continue.
In addition, 570 people from 398 households were forced to leave their homes due to flooding, while 1,253 people from 724 households were temporarily evacuated.
Heavy rain warnings in Seoul and the metropolitan area were lifted Wednesday morning, with rain clouds moving southward toward North and South Chungcheong provinces, southern Gangwon province and North Gyeongsang province.
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Now, coffee is one of Vietnam’s major export commodities worth more than $3 billion a year, alongside other high-value products such as wood, seafood, cashew nuts, rice, vegetables, and rubber.
The first coffee beans were imported into Vietnam in the 19th century by French colonialists, who realized that the climate of the central highlands was perfect for growing the popular drink.
Arabica was the first variety produced before the high-yielding robusta was introduced in 1908 as well.
In 1986, following the reunification of Vietnam, the Doi Moi (Renewal) economic reforms led to a rise in the privatization of land and commodities. The Government saw potential in coffee as a cash crop for exports and internal usage, so it established state-funded farms and encouraged Central Highlands landowners to cultivate coffee.
In 2021, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Vietnam’s coffee exports still brought in over $3 billion, contributing to the overall growth of the country’s commodity exports.
During the first five months of this year, Vietnam shipped 889,000 tons of coffee worth over $2 billion abroad, representing a year-on-year rise of 24.2% in volume and 54% in value, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
According to industry insiders, global coffee prices are projected to continue rising in the future, creating a wealth of opportunities for Vietnamese coffee exporters to boost their exports.
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South Korea will push for fast inbound entry for foreign workers and expand the quota for businesses to hire foreigners to resolve workforce shortages in the industrial sector, economic policymakers said Monday.
The government plans to seek fast entry of 42,000 foreign workers, whose immigration process has been delayed during the period between 2020 and the first half of 2022. In addition, immigration checks for 20,000 expatriates, who are destined to visit Korea on work visas in the second half of 2022, will be streamlined, according to the Finance Ministry.
“As for industries, which have additional demands for manpower despite fast entry, the government will expand the quota for foreign workers in August, and determine the quota for 2023 as soon as possible,” said Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Choo Kyung-ho at a ministerial meeting held to map out measures to vitalize the economy.
The minister expressed worries over the shipbuilding sector, saying that its workforce shortage has aggravated as the number of overseas orders has been increasing.
For only the shipbuilding sector, policymakers are moving to launch an extraordinary quota for “skilled” expatriate workers. Currently, the tally for foreign workers in expertise in the sector remains at about 2,000.
“Despite businesses’ commitment to hiring (more), the number of vacant jobs came to 234,000 as of June, which marked the highest (in more than four years) since February 2018,” he said.
“Some 224,000 of the 234,000 vacant jobs were held by small and medium-sized enterprises with fewer than 300 staff.”
The government will also sell off some state-owned assets that remain idle, the finance minister said.
“The government will sell unused and idle assets worth 16 trillion won ($12.2 billion) or more over the next five years,” he said.
According to the Finance Ministry, the collective value of state-owned land and buildings exceeded 700 trillion won as of 2021, and up to 5 per cent of the assets could be listed for sale to the private sector.
Officials said the planned sale is projected to improve the nation’s fiscal soundness by offsetting massive state spending on pandemic relief.
Critics have been holding the new administration‘s policy drive to slash corporate taxes and income taxes for the wealthy bracket responsible for worsening fiscal status. The fiscal ministry, however, has been downplaying such concern.
At the ministerial meeting, Minister Choo said the government plans to unveil measures to tackle a possible spike in consumer prices ahead of the Chuseok holiday later this week.
He added that the real estate policy on the supply of more homes will also be publicized this week.
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Baidu Inc announced on Monday that it has secured China’s first permits to offer driverless robotaxi services to the public, thus marking a significant milestone for the autonomous ride-hailing industry that is expected to accelerate large-scale commercial use of self-driving technology.
They said China has taken the lead in the research and development as well as application of self-driving technologies and it is the first country to allow fully driverless paid robotaxi operations.
Apollo Go, Baidu’s autonomous ride-hailing service, is authorized to charge fares for robotaxi services－completely without human drivers in the car－in Chongqing and Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province.
The new permits, which were granted by authorities in Wuhan and Yongchuan district, Chongqing, will allow Baidu to provide paid services for fully driverless robotaxis in designated areas in Wuhan from 9 am to 5 pm, and in Chongqing from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm, with five self-driving vehicles operating in each city.
The service areas cover 13 square kilometres in the Wuhan Economic & Technological Development Zone, and 30 square kilometres in Chongqing’s Yongchuan.
“This is a tremendous qualitative change,” said Wei Dong, vice-president and chief safety operation officer of Baidu’s Intelligent Driving Group, adding that fully driverless cars providing rides on open roads to paying customers mean they have finally come to the moment the industry has been longing for.
To receive the permits, Baidu’s robotaxis have undergone multiple steps of testing and licensing, starting from tests carried out with a safety operator in the drivers’ seat to a safety operator in the passenger seat, before finally receiving authorization to operate autonomous vehicles with no human drivers or operators in the vehicle, the company said.
Zhang Xiang, a researcher at the Automobile Industry Innovation Research Center at the North China University of Technology in Beijing, said approval to operate fully driverless robotaxis in Wuhan and Chongqing is a critical milestone in the transition from Level 3 to Level 4 autonomous driving capability, which means the vehicle can drive by itself under most circumstances without a human backup driver.
“The move is of great significance to dramatically reduce labour costs and lays a solid foundation for bolstering large-scale commercialization of autonomous driving technology in China,” Zhang said.
The manufacturing costs of driverless vehicles’ components, such as lidar sensor systems, have declined along with advances in self-driving technology and the maturity of related industrial chains, he added.
China has caught up with the United States in autonomous driving development, with Wuhan and Chongqing allowing driverless vehicles to carry passengers and charge for such services, said Lyu Jinghong, an intelligent mobility analyst at research firm BloombergNEF.
Lyu said more Chinese cities are expected to follow the two pioneering urban centres by gradually allowing for robotaxi pilots and commercialization, which will help autonomous driving developers improve their technologies and explore business models.
Experts have also warned that firms should proceed cautiously, especially when it comes to public safety.
Fan Fei Fei
China Daily
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