MYANMAR must build its own capacity for overseeing the introduction of genetically-modified food products, the Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation, U Ohn Myint, said in Yangon earlier this month.

GARDENING events were held at the 40,525 government schools throughout the country on July 10 to mark School Green Environment Day.

FORTY public access centres will be opened throughout the country next month as part of a campaign to promote the use of the internet and highlight the advantages of information and communications technology.

WORK is continuing on a replica of the royal palace at Bagan and the main wooden building is expected to be completed in September, one of the architects involved in the project said last week.

BUS fares in Yangon are to rise to help cover the cost of converting the vehicles to run on compressed natural gas, the commander of the Yangon Division Traffic Police Force, Lieutenant-Colonel Aung Naing.

A GROUP of 38 government doctors newly appointed to the Health Department’s Public Health division have undergone a training course to teach them to promote healthy life styles.

SOME gem mines at Mongshu in southern Shan State will reopen soon after being ordered to close for safety reasons following a landslide, a senior official from the Ministry of Mining said last week.

MYANMAR environmentalists have welcomed a decision by the six-member Greater Mekong Sub-region grouping to establish a series of conservation corridors aimed at preserving wildlife and forests. The decision to launch the Biodiversity Conservation Corridors Initiative was made at a GMS summit in Kunming, the capital of China’s Yunnan Province, on July 5.

AN international non-government organisation, Malteser International, is planning to expand its anti-malaria activities to the northern Wa region in Shan State, its country coordinator said earlier this month.

THE Myanmar Fisheries Federation is due to take over the chairmanship of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Fisheries Federation next year, an MFF official said last week.

A BIRD species previously unrecorded in Southeast Asia, the grey-bellied cuckoo, was sighted last month during the first wet season trip organised by the Myanmar Bird and Nature Society to the Indawgyi Wildlife Sanctuary in Kachin State.