Okami how to feed the canine warriors

The deal will serve as a beachhead for Tenaga in the Vietnamese solar market

In a filing to Bursa Malaysia today, TNB said this acquisition extends TNB’s collaboration with Sunseap, beyond the Malaysia and Singapore cross-border partnership, to capture the rapid growth in the Vietnamese renewable energy market, as reported by The Malaysian Reserve .

The acquired project has secured the Feed-in Tariff (FiT) 2 rates in Vietnam. Having achieved commercial operation date in December 2020, all five plants are under 20-year Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) with EVN to supply clean energy to the national grid.

Sunseap currently holds a 90 per cent stake in the projects, which will be reduced to 51 per cent upon completion of the 39 per cent stake acquisition by TNB Renewables slated for the first quarter of this year. Sun Times Energy JSC, an existing shareholder of the project, will continue to own 10 per cent equity interest in the project, according to TNB.

“This acquisition will serve as a beachhead for TNB to establish a local presence in Vietnam and expand into the rapidly growing renewable energy and utility market in Vietnam. This acquisition builds on our earlier Malaysia-Singapore cross-border collaboration with Sunseap and demonstrates our commitment in transforming TNB into a regional renewable energy and utility player,” said TNB’s president and CEO Datuk Ir. Baharin Din.

By TNB

According to the Government Inspectorate, the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs has yet to pay due attention to the legitimate rights and interests of people employed abroad and come up with suitable measures to help reduce worker costs.

“For a long period of time, the ministry has not been able to manage or control official and brokerage fees of businesses running the service, which had caused workers (who in fact are all poor) to pay a large amount of money even when the policy of receiving markets (Japan and Taiwan) does not require them to pay.”

The conclusion of the inspectorate was announced at a Thursday meeting by its deputy head Tran Ngoc Liem.

Government inspectors had looked into what had been achieved and what had been done wrong in sending workers abroad under contracts from six provinces in northern and central regions, including Vinh Phuc, Phu Tho, Hai Duong, Hung Yen, Nghe An and Ha Tinh, in the 2013-2018 period.

They pointed out fee regulations applied to Vietnamese workers in Japan are not in line with Japanese policies or the agreement signed between the two countries, which had affected laborers.

Due to the loose management of the ministry’s Overseas Labor Management Department, workers had been made to pay a “very high fee of $7,000-8,000 per month,” the inspectorate stated.

In many cases, the high fee had forced many Vietnamese to remain abroad after their contracts and visas had expired to recover their costs, it noted.

As for the six provinces, the inspectors said authorities there had also failed to fulfill their duties, while companies providing “study abroad” consultancies in fact feeded the foreign labor market.

Inspectors also discovered laborers that had voluntarily, or through a broker, gone abroad to “travel, visit relatives or get married”, then stayed behind to work illegally.

In most cases, destinations include Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada, Angola and Eastern European countries.

In 2019, as many as 134,482 of the 147,387 Vietnamese workers who went abroad in 2019 were hired in Japan and Taiwan, official statistics show.

Last year, the number of Vietnamese workers going abroad dropped to 78,000 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

By staff writers – Translated by Kim Khanh

A monkey is given food by a visitor at a destination in Da Nang. Son Tra District in Da Nang has launched a conservation project on the protection of monkey and primates in the Son Tra Nature Reserve. — Photo courtesy of Tran Huu Vy

Director of GreenViet, Tran Huu Vy, said the research, which began last December, has been tracking the habitat and population of the monkeys as well as food chains to limit risks of conflict with human activities.

He said the research was urgent as many flocks of monkey had left their habitat in the primary forest to seek food from tourists and offerings at temples and pagodas at the foot of Son Tra mountain recently. Monkeys had conflicts with people when local residents and visitors tried to feed them.

Monkeys even broke into kitchens and fruit farms in the reserve, raising risks of transmitting viruses between the primates and people.

Despite serious warnings to not feed monkeys in the reserve, some local residents and tourists have given monkeys fruit, snacks and bread in the reserve.

Local rangers said they believed a group of 30 monkeys that used to gather by the Linh Ung Pagoda to seek food from visitors returned to their natural habitat during COVID-19 social distancing orders between April and July.

However, the monkeys reappeared at some destinations to get food from tourists during the Tet (Lunar New Year) holidays.

A monkey that has suffered a cut. Many monkeys have been injured or killed in conflicts with human activities in the Son Tra Nature reserve in Da Nang over past years. — Photo courtesy of Nguyen Cong Hung

Vy, a biodiversity conservationist, said it was important to stop feeding monkeys at tourism sites and long-term research should be built-in with the conservation and protection of the monkeys.

Research by a group of conservationists from GreenViet and Da Nang University’s Science and Education College found there were about 50 herds of rhesus macaques with more than 500 individuals living in the reserve.

Biologists also warned that monkeys living in the reserve could break into resorts, causing trouble for tourists and management if local authorities do not have any effective solutions for the conservation and protection of the primates.

According to Son Tra-Ngu Hanh Son forest protection sub-department, some traffic accidents occurred in the area in recent years when cars and motorbikes hit monkeys crossing the road.

Last year, a baby monkey was grabbed by a local man at Linh Ung Pagoda, while two other monkeys were killed by household dogs at farms in the reserve.

At least eight rhesus monkeys were found living at the Linh Ung Pagoda with serious injuries or missing limbs, according to local freelance photographer Nguyen Cong Hung.

Kids join a painting session on wildlife and nature protection at GreenViet’s Nature Dance Centre — an education centre on nature and environment in Son Tra nature reserve of Da Nang. — VNS Photo Cong Thanh

Six monkeys were killed by motorcyclists in 2015-17, and two cases of illegal hunting were uncovered in the area, with three red-shanked douc langurs killed for money.

The rhesus macaque is listed as Least Concern in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s red list of threatened species.

The 4,400ha reserve is home to more than 1,300 red-shanked douc langurs – an endangered primate species listed by IUCN – and more than 1,000 plant and 370 animal species including 15 flora and 25 fauna species listed as the most threatened species in the world.

It hosts at least 10,000 people each month.  VNS