Can Thailand's tourism industry go "green"?

7pm Weds, February 10, 2010

Snacks and wine provided, no cover charge

 

Tourism can play a leading role in preserving the environment, enhancing the development of local communities and confronting climate change.

Exploring a host of regional itineraries in the Kingdom, former Bangkok based correspondent Richard Werly spent months touring Thailand in 2009, studying efforts made by scores of individuals and businesses, as well as Thai governmental and non-governmental agencies to improve the ecological stake of the tourism sector.

As a result, Werly and his team of journalists and researchers have produced Travel Green Thailand, the first ecotourism guidebook now available in the country.

Already widely distributed in Europe, and soon to be available commercially in Thailand, Travel Green Thailand reports about the possibilities of green tourism and highlights the difficulties, inherent barriers and inconvenient truths of Thailand's powerful tourism sector.

With the support of the European Union and Centre for European Studies of Chulalongkorn University, please join us for the launch of the book and a panel discussion on "Can Thailand's tourism industry go 'green'?"

Panellists include:

- Dr Pradech Phayakvichien, former Governor of Tourism Authority of Thailand. He is one of the founders of the Green Leaf Foundation initiated at the end of 1997 to help hotels improve their efficiency in saving energy, water and other resources.

- Christopher Stafford General Manager of Anantara Resort and Spa and an International Hotelier with experience over the past 28 years in Europe, Australia, Tahiti, the Maldives, Singapore and Thailand.

- Duangkamol Chansuriwong, President of TEATA (Thai Ecotourism and Adventure Travel Association) and the founder of WildThailand company. The initiator of an EU financed project on Thai sustainable tourism supply chains, she has committed her organization to help develop new and update existing sustainibility standards and new integrated sustainable tourism routes in the Kingdom.

- Richard Werly, author and producer of Travel Green Thailand. He is presently the European bureau chief of the Swiss daily le Temps in Brussels and a former Bangkok correspondent.

The discussion will be moderated by Professor Charit Tingsabadh, Director of the Centre for European Studies at Chulalongkorn University.

*This program is a paid event. Responsibility for programme content is solely that of the event organizer.

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