Philippines

Hanoi (VNA) - Philippine authorities on January 20 ordered a crackdown on visits to the danger zone around Taal volcano as scientists warned it could be "recharging" for a more powerful explosion. Speaking to the media, Undersecretary for the Department of Interior of the Philippines Epimaco Densing said not any evacuees are allowed to visit their homes within the 14-kilometre radius of the danger zone. More than 110,000 people have taken refuge in evacuation centres since Taal burst to life a week ago, but many hard-hit towns have let residents back for hours each day to fetch items, feed livestock and clean up their houses. However, seismologists have warned the volcano could imminently unleash a much bigger eruption. Taal has erupted more than 30 times in the past five centuries, most recently in 1977. The Philippines lies on the "Ring of Fire", a belt of volcanoes girdling the Pacific Ocean that is also prone to earthquakes./. … [Read more...] about Philippines cracks down on evacuation as volcano recharges

"With significantly greater throughput and much lower latency, 5G will allow brands to power new kinds of consumer experiences. Both volume and quality of content consumed will increase with 5G; that includes not only video but also the more vivid immersive experiences like AR and VR," said Francis, adding, "However, with only 20% of marketers already familiar with 5G, advertisers will have to work strategically with the right partners to realise the opportunities possible with the 5G revolution." … [Read more...] about Future-ready with 5G: Speed for consumers, innovation for advertisers in South East Asia

Ms Peng will remain as chairwoman and will assume the additional role of CEO. She is one of the 18 founders and a senior partner in Alibaba Group. She replaces Mr Bittner, who has been CEO since 2012 and will transit to the role of senior adviser to "assist in the transition and future international growth strategy". … [Read more...] about Alibaba to invest S$2.6b more in Lazada, replaces CEO

Hanoi (VNA) – The Malaysian government said on January 20 that the country will send back an additional 110 containers of plastic waste to source nations after having successfully returned 150. According to the Ministry of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change, 150 containers with estimated 3,737 metric tonnes of plastic waste had been returned to the source countries, mostly developed countries such as the US, the UK, Japan, Canada, Spain and France. Minister of Energy, Technology, Science, Climate Change and Environment Yeo Bee Yin said at a press conference at Butterworth Port in Penang state that the additional 110 containers to be sent back include 60 from the US, 15 from Canada and 14 from Japan, while others came from the UK, Belgium, Mexico, Hungary, France and Jamaica. The Minister said the containers had been sent back without the government incurring any costs, which had been borne by the companies responsible for importing the plastic waste … [Read more...] about Malaysia to send containers of plastic waste back to source countries

Starting from this year, Vietnam is going to implement the ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement (ATIGA). Accordingly, sugar products from countries in the ASEAN imported into Vietnam will not be imposed quotas so there is a high possibility that the price of imported sugar will be cheaper than the domestic one. Moreover, the domestic sugar industry has been always facing difficulties because of smuggled sugar so this is expected to be a rough year for the domestic sugar industry. Last year, Thailand exported more than 1 million tons of sugar to Cambodia but only 200,000 tons of sugar were consumed here so the rest 800,000 tons of sugar might be smuggled into Vietnam. On average, Vietnam needs 1.45 million tons of sugar annually which can be provided sufficiently by the domestic sugar industry. However, cheap smuggled sugar competes with domestic sugar, hurting the domestic sugar industry. At a meeting on prevention of sugar smuggling, Mr. Truong Van Ba, Deputy Chief of the Standing Office … [Read more...] about Vietnam’s sugar industry expected to face more difficulties this year