Thailand is planning to achieve net zero emissions by 2065, 15 years later than its neighbours in the lower Mekong region. The country is seeking funding for climate response, and although its delegate at COP28 said Thailand is expecting some financial assistance from the Loss and Damage Fund, it will need other sources since the amount of grants given by the Fund is likely to be limited.

The long-overdue Loss and Damage Fund to assist climate responses has become a huge political question during the first day of COP28. As negotiations are on going and countries continue to pledge to the Fund, Thailand's negotiation team says access to the Fund should be based on how hard a country has been hit by climate change and not its GDP.

COP28 opens tomorrow (30 November) in Dubai, and carbon credit is still on the agenda. Thailand, which has pledged to become a carbon-neutral country by 2050 and carbon-zero by 2065, is turning towards a carbon credit market while its major corporations explore low-carbon businesses. However, local communities are skeptical and have raised concerns that their land and natural resources would be exploited by private businesses selling carbon credits.

From 30 November - 12 December, world leaders will gather in Dubai for the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP28 to discuss the climate crisis. But where is Thailand in this issue? The country has turned to the carbon credit market on its road to carbon neutrality and net zero, but the civil society has questions about its effectiveness and are concerned about the market being taken over by corporations.

At the opening ceremony of the 2nd Thailand Climate Action Conference, Greenpeace Thailand activists launched a series of protests, holding a banner with a message ‘Our forest ≠ Carbon credit, Stop Greenwashing’, and projecting a laser message that read ‘Stop forest carbon offset, Real-Zero Not Net-Zero’ directed at the country’s new prime minister Srettha Thavisin and the Thai government to decouple its climate policy from false solutions like carbon offsetting scheme.

Last Friday (6 October), activists from the People’s Movement for a Just Society (P-Move) went to the Queen Sirikit National Convention Centre (QSNCC), where the 2023 Thailand Climate Action Conference is taking place, to protest government policies that would greenwash the country’s major corporations while worsening inequality.

<p>As the 26th session of the Conference of Parties (COP26) to the UN United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Glasgow comes to a close, members and partners of Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD) reiterate their rejection to false climate solutions reflected in the COP26 outcomes that further burden grassroots women and perpetuate plunder of resources of global south countries.</p>

<p>Five Thai companies have been identified as the top plastic polluters locally responsible for plastic pollution affecting two provinces, according to the latest <a href="https://www.greenpeace.org/thailand/publication/18363/plastic-brand-audit-result-thailand-2020/">brand audit report</a> conducted by Greenpeace Thailand.&nbsp;</p>

<p>On&nbsp;International Earth Day, and as the coronavirus epidemic rages on in Southeast Asia, and the rest of the world, regional MPs are today warning of the need to combat climate change and environmental destruction in order to lower the risk of future health emergencies.</p>

<p>Thailand&rsquo;s <a href="https://prachatai.com/english/node/8325">smog crisis</a> continues in Bangkok and other provinces for a second week, with pollution readings at hazardous levels, while the spokesperson of the Prime Minister&rsquo;s Office has insisted that the situation has yet to reach a crisis level and asks the public not to panic.</p>

<p>As the deadline for the submission of countries&rsquo; climate change action plans to the Paris agreement (NDCs) draws to a close, regional lawmakers urge ASEAN member states to review their climate ambitions</p>

<p>The Heinrich Böll Foundation (HBF) and Greenpeace held a press briefing last Thursday (12 December) at the Heinrich Böll Foundation Southeast Asia office in Bangkok, in which representatives of the two organizations called for a new global convention on the plastic crisis and for a whole-cycle approach to managing plastic waste.</p>