Ministers discuss migrant issue

Aung Kyi met with NGO representatives from The Bateed Foundation, Mekong Migration Network and MAP Foundation to discuss ways to protect Myanmar workers. 

He also met Interior Minister Yongyuth Wichaidit and urged him to take appropriate steps to make sure Myanmar workers enjoyed the same salaries as Thais and had a right to send their children to Thai schools; Thai employers did not hold onto the workers’ passports; and those without passports got temporary ones. 

Aung Kyi then called on the Thai Immigration Bureau commissioner. They discussed measures to prevent human trafficking that can result in Myanmar workers being sent back to the border without prior information. They also discussed the issuing of temporary passports. 

 

Call to save ‘major blood vessel’

Environmental experts called for biodiversity conservation in the Maykha and Malikha valleys, the Ayeyawaddy River watershed, to save the major blood vessel of the country.

Win Myo Thu, from Economically Progressive Ecosystems Development, said biodiversity conservation needs to be conducted for 67 per cent and 48 per cent of the Maykha and Malikha river valleys, respectively. “Myanmar is among the countries that have ratified the 1992 Convention of Biodiversity. Every country that takes part in the treaty has committed to protecting globally endangered specifies,” he said. 

 

More choose to stay single

More people in Myanmar are choosing to remain single due to the rising cost of living and changes in lifestyle, giving higher priority to education, an official from the United Nations Population Fund said.

The official commented that the fertility rate is also declining after marriage. The proportion of those that never married increased between 1973 and 2007, with the increase more prominent for the younger age groups.