OPINION

No sweetness here

Re: "China rejects B400m in Thai syrup shipments", (Business, Jan 4).

It's a poor way to raise concerns once the shipments have reached Chinese ports. Surely, there is a better way. Meanwhile, China is quite happy to dump faulty products and contaminated food into Thailand without facing recriminations.

Pollution problems

Re: "BMA explores new ways to curb harmful dust particles in city", (BP, Jan 5) and "Full plastic import ban faces hurdles", (BP, Jan 5).

"Harmful dust particles" in Bangkok don't surprise me. I've had a sore throat with lung irritation the last week. I've started wearing N95 Covid masks again because they filter most of the particles. I hope the 300 tonnes of CO2 (dry ice) help. Changing engine oil & air filters is mandatory in nearly all civilised countries. In the UK, where I'm from, it is illegal to drive any polluting vehicles in cities. I spent more time in Thailand than in England this year and noticed the air quality had deteriorated. Tourism will be affected without improvement, never mind health.

Also published on your front page yesterday was the difficulty in securing an import ban on scrap plastic. Plastic waste distribution is featured in Buy Now on Netflix. Also, it mentions that 12m tonnes of plastic are manufactured every second. Our oceans are full of these polymers. They've even made their way into drinking water!

Last week, the Bangkok Post published the worst plastic polluters globally by country; Thailand was 5th. However, as you pointed out, per capita head, Thailand's citizens consume the most plastic in the world!

Come on, Thailand, you can do better! I love this country enough to have visited here for 26 consecutive years. Please lessen your pollution so my children can follow in my tourist footsteps.

Happy to be back

I am so pleased to have found the Bangkok Post and PostBag again after losing it for a while. For me, it is evidence that we appreciate the difference between traditional journalism and what digital options bring us.

I was happy to see another PostBag reader who reminded us of a PostBag contributor he fondly remembered. There were always some people who seemed to make a hobby of getting published every day, some good, some not so much. Our current candidate, who seems to appear in PostBag almost every day, is Michel Setter. I wish I knew him. He writes well and on a wide range of subjects. Great. In PostBag, Mr Setter criticised me by name on Dec 22, which others apparently have done too, based on what he said. Okay. But I consider this forum a community of readers with a stake in this newspaper's welfare.

PostBag doesn't print everything. I sent a letter asking if there is a way we can test our tap water. It hasn't been printed (maybe tomorrow). It seemed like a subject many would like to know about, either in the letter or in a reply from a PostBag writer. Maybe Mr Setter can speak to that.

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