A Few Words From Me
Three governments seem to have landed on the same idea this week: that how people move through a place matters as much as where they go. Thailand has started training its first proper hiking guides, launched at Khao Yai, one of the national parks that together see more than ten million visitors a year and, between them, well over a thousand tonnes of litter left behind annually. The idea is straightforward: guides trained in Leave No Trace principles, rather than visitors working it out for themselves. Hanoi has already banned petrol motorbikes from parts of its Old Quarter, and Bangkok looks close to doing the same with tuk-tuks, both aimed at the same basic problem, too many combustion engines in streets built for walking that are hot and dusty enough without the extra fumes. Laos is getting serious about promoting its culture to the world: a new national body backing the country’s music, food and ceremony as an economic asset in its own right, and I love that this part of the world is pushing at the boundaries, rather than rehashing tired themes. Cambodia’s Siem Reap discount campaign is also back in this issue, it broke just after our Siem Reap feature went out and only made it in as a late addition there, so this is the fuller version in case you missed it. And in Raja Ampat, off West Papua in eastern Indonesia, a reminder that progress rarely finishes cleanly: one nickel mining licence is still active, a year after public pressure forced four others out of the same reef system, worth a proper read if diving there has ever crossed your mind. On a practical note, the monsoon has properly set in across most of the region now, so pack for it, but the forests are at their greenest and the cloud cover means considerably less risk of getting burnt than the dry season brings. The Green Season is a good time, if you don’t mind a shower, to see the region looking more colourful than how the brochures usually show it. As always, I welcome your feedback and if you’re already on the ground, let me know how things are shaping up for you.
This Week in Southeast Asia
Thailand Opens Ten Schools to Train Conservation Hiking Guides
Thailand’s Department of National Parks has opened ten “Khon Doen Pa” schools, training park rangers as certified conservation hiking instructors under Leave No Trace principles. It marks a genuine shift from cleaning up damage after the fact – to preventing it before visitors set foot on a trail. The numbers explain why: Thailand’s national parks now draw more than 10 million visitors a year, and protected forests are left with over 1,000 tonnes of waste annually. The first school opened at Khao Yai National Park, part of the Dong Phayayen-Khao Yai UNESCO World Heritage forest complex, around three hours from Bangkok.
The curriculum itself is more than a safety briefing. Trip planning, waste management, and how to behave around wildlife all sit inside the Leave No Trace framework, and the department’s stated aim is to reframe hiking as environmentally responsible tourism rather than pure recreation, treating the forest as a home you are a guest in rather than a backdrop. Natural Resources and Environment Minister Suchart Chomklin, who opened the first school on 31 July, has said the department plans to expand the programme across national parks and forest parks nationwide, with the explicit goal of getting Thailand’s nature-tourism standards recognised internationally, not just at home. Guides are already required on Khao Yai’s toughest trails, so it’s a good idea to book one on your next visit regardless, and watch for the wider rollout as more parks bring instructors online.
Guides are already compulsory on Khao Yai’s harder trails, this new programme just makes sure they know what they’re doing. Photo: The Standard
Laos Turns Its Living Culture Into a National Priority
Laos has launched a new Cultural Values Promotion Association, tasked with building the country’s heritage into a genuine creative economy for artists, performers and cultural entrepreneurs, not just a backdrop for photographs. The launch followed Vientiane’s first khaen festival, celebrating the UNESCO-listed reed instrument at the centre of Lao music, and sits inside a 2026-2030 strategy that already covers a pending UNESCO nomination for the local culinary favourite larb and the Su Khuan blessing ceremony. Association president Savanhkhone Razmountry says cultural attractions already draw four to five million visitors a year, a figure the government clearly wants to build on rather than treat as a ceiling.
The association’s first task is a national inventory of intangible cultural assets, essentially a formal stocktake of what Laos actually has before it decides what to protect and promote next, which suggests this is meant to be a working body rather than a ceremonial one. It is not the only heritage story in motion this month: ASEAN heritage assessors arrive in mid-August to inspect the 4,000 square kilometre Nakai-Nam Theun forest, hoping to secure Heritage Park status for it by 2028. Between the two, Laos is making a reasonably coherent case for itself as a culture-and-nature destination rather than either alone. It’s a good year to build a Laos trip around living culture rather than scenery by itself.
The khaen has been played in Laos for centuries, this week it became the centrepiece of a national strategy. Photo: J&C Laos
Siem Reap’s Green Season Sale Cuts Prices by Up to Half
Cambodia’s Ministry of Tourism has launched the “2026 Siem Reap Tourism Service Mega Sale,” a pilot discount campaign offering 10 to 50 per cent off at more than 50 participating three-to-five-star hotels, restaurants and tour operators through the Green Season, which runs to October. It follows directly from last week’s coverage of Angkor’s visitor decline, when Angkor Archaeological Park recorded a 31 per cent drop in ticket sales over the first half of 2026, and this campaign is the ministry’s direct answer: cheaper rates, fuller moats around the temples, and far smaller crowds than the dry season brings. It is run jointly with the Siem Reap Chapter of the Cambodia Hotel Association and the Siem Reap Tourism Club Association, and bookings go through the official Cambodia Wonder portal. The offer sits alongside the wider spend-local case we made in our recent Siem Reap feature, and given the scale of the decline it’s answering, worth genuine consideration if a Cambodia trip has been on your bucket list.
Bangkok and Hanoi Push Petrol Engines Out of Their Old Quarters
Two capitals, two different speeds. Bangkok’s Department of Land Transport is consulting the public until 27 August on a proposal to ban petrol-powered tuk-tuks from the inner city around Wat Phra Kaew and the royal temples, exempting electric tuk-tuks outright. Department director-general Sorapong Paitoonphong has been at pains to stress that reports of an imminent ban are premature: no regulation has gone to government yet, and conventional vehicles may end up time-restricted rather than banned outright once the consultation closes.
Hanoi is a step ahead. The city’s fossil-fuel phase-out was ordered by Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh back in 2025, and the original plan was sweeping, a full ban across 26 square kilometres inside Ring Road 1. What actually launched on 1 July is smaller and more targeted: petrol motorbikes and Grab bikes barred from eleven streets in the Old Quarter’s Hoan Kiem Ward, weekends and Friday evenings only, in a district where PM2.5 levels run at roughly double the national standard. Tour operators there have already shifted to electric rentals for Old Quarter routes, and the city’s longer-term plan extends the restrictions across Ring Roads 1 and 2 by 2028. If a Bangkok or Hanoi old-town trip is on the cards this year, build in a little extra planning time around vehicle access, particularly in Hanoi where the rules are already live rather than pending.
On these eleven streets, weekends and Friday evenings now belong to electric wheels only.
The Reef That Won’t Quite Let Go of Its Miners
Raja Ampat should, by now, be free of nickel mining. Public backlash in 2025 forced Indonesia to revoke four mining licences across the archipelago, after Greenpeace footage of forest clearing on Gag, Kawe and Manuran islands, showing more than 500 hectares of destroyed forest and vegetation, racked up over 15 million views online. Officials pledged at the time to protect what they called a world-class tourist attraction.
Three-quarters of the world’s coral species live in these waters, one mining licence is still a threat to them.
One licence remains active: PT Gag Nikel, a subsidiary of state miner Antam, continues operating in a UNESCO Global Geopark that holds roughly three-quarters of the world’s coral species. Greenpeace and local communities are still pressing for its closure, pointing to the same deforestation and sedimentation risk that forced the other four licences out, threatening reefs that make Raja Ampat one of the region’s genuine luxury diving destinations. The 2025 campaign worked once, for four out of five operators. It is a live case study in what public pressure can and cannot yet finish, and a reminder that the choice of diving operator here still matters.
What’s On
This Week
UBUD VILLAGE JAZZ FESTIVAL: Ubud, Bali, Indonesia | 7-8 August 2026
The 13th edition of Bali’s best-loved jazz weekend fills the riverside gardens of Sthala Ubud with Indonesian and international acts across two nights. Tickets are largely sold out but worth checking for returns.
LANNA HAUTE COUTURE: Chiang Mai, Thailand | 8 August 2026
An open-air fashion showcase reinterpreting northern Thai Lanna textiles through contemporary runway design, staged at one of Chiang Mai’s landmark intersections.
Coming Up
HOI AN FULL MOON LANTERN FESTIVAL: Hoi An, Vietnam | 26 August 2026
The town’s electric lights go dark, thousands of silk lanterns take over, and the Thu Bon River fills with floating candles. Genuinely worth timing a Hoi An visit around.
BAYBEATS: Singapore | 3-6 September 2026
Singapore’s largest independent and alternative music festival returns to the Esplanade waterfront for four days, a good excuse to build a weekend around Singapore’s live music scene beyond the usual big-name arena shows.
Worth Reading
This week’s Raja Ampat story is about protecting a reef, our archive piece explains exactly what its UNESCO status was meant to guarantee in the first place, and why that recognition alone was never going to be enough: Raja Ampat’s UNESCO Status Changes the Game for Sustainable Diving in Southeast Asia.
Follow Asia Unmasked on Facebook and X/Twitter for daily updates from across the region.
