Mekong nations hold 16th Transboundary Haze Pollution Technical Working Group Meeting

The 16th Meeting of the Technical Working Group on Transboundary Haze Pollution in the Mekong Sub-Region was convened by Myanmar on 7 December at Office No. 58, Department of Environmental Conservation.
Representatives and Senior environmental officials from the Mekong Sub-Region: Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Viet Nam, representatives from ASMC, EU, IUCN, GIZ, GEC, CIFOR and IFAD, international partners and officials from related agencies in Myanmar, and Department of Forest, officials from Directorate of Meteorology and Hydrology, Department of Agriculture, Representatives from Department of Land Management and Statistics, Department of Disaster Management, and the Department of Public Health attended the meeting.
At the meeting, Dr San Oo, Deputy Director-General of the Department of Environmental Conservation, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation chaired the meeting, and Mr Athapol Charoenshunsa, Director-General of the Department of Environmental Pollution Control of Thailand, co-chaired the meeting.
At the meeting, Dr San Oo, Deputy Director-General of the Department of Environmental Conservation, said that cross-border smog, one of the effects of ground fire, was a significant impact on ASEAN member countries.
“The Mekong Sub-region countries have formed technical working groups to jointly implement cross-border smog problems. Myanmar suffers from forest fires and we are coordinating with relevant departments and organizations to prevent smog,” he added.
Dr San Oo said that coordination is also being made between ASEAN countries and other international organizations.
Next, ASEAN Specialized Meteorological Centre (ASMC) analyzes the situation of smog in the Mekong Sub-Region ‌discussion.
Then officials presented the national implementation of the 2017 Chiang Rai Action Plan and the implementation of the 2017 Chiang Rai Action Plan by Mekong Sub-region countries including Myanmar in the dry season.
ASMC also provided meteorologically and smog analysis and Thai officials discussed joint indicators to reduce fires by 20 per cent.
Discussions were made at telecommunication conferences in the Mekong Sub-Region.
The ASEAN Secretariat discussed cooperation in fire and smog control in the Mekong Sub-Region and progress has been made in cooperation with the Mekong Sub-Region, according to the meeting.
The ASEAN Secretariat will review the ASEAN Roadmap for Cooperation in Steering of Transboundary Haze Pollution (2016-2020). It will be approved at the Ministerial Meeting on Transboundary Haze Pollution. —MNA