BMA and Yokohama join hands to move forward in solving environmental problems

Chadchart Sittipunt, Governor of Bangkok, is welcoming Dr Takeharu Yamanaka, Mayor of Yokohama City and the Yokohama City Executive Committee Japan as well as representatives of the Japanese Embassy in Thailand. This is on the occasion of visiting BKK EXPO 2024 at the Benchakitti Forest Park Museum building, Khlong Toei District in the discussion of environmental problems.

At this event, Chadchart and Dr Takeharu participated in a special lecture at the centre stage at BKK EXPO 2024 on the topic of cooperation in sustainable development for a society with zero net greenhouse gas emissions.

Chadchart welcomed Dr Takeharu and the delegation saying that he was pleased to have the opportunity to welcome the Mayor of Yokohama on the occasion of his visit to Bangkok with the honour of attending the BKK EXPO.

BMA and Yokohama have continuously cooperated for 11 years since 2013 through a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on sustainable urban development.

This technical and academic support promotes the development of a low-carbon society for Bangkok in continuously creating an environmentally friendly city. In addition, the city of Yokohama plays an important role in implementing the City-to-City project and the collaboration for Zero-Carbon Society, a project under the support of the Ministry of Environment Japan.

This initiative supports the implementation of Bangkok’s master plan on climate change and promotes activities to exchange knowledge and technology in reducing greenhouse gases with the private sector to achieve sustainable development. This includes the creation of the first Bangkok Energy Action Plan to concretely control carbon emissions in both the transportation and energy sectors.

“The world is currently facing unprecedented climate challenges. Many of you may have heard of the student rally in Oslo in 2019 where one student held a sign that read ‘You’ll die of old age, but I’ll die of climate change’. If we do not have clear guidelines or policies, In the end, we and the world cannot survive. Working together to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to zero is therefore one of the important goals of all of us to protect the lives of our children and grandchildren,” said Chadchart.

For his part, Dr Takeharu stated that he was honoured to have the opportunity to participate in this great event that was packed with important content in shaping the city of BMA The city of Yokohama has had long-term cooperation in environmental technology with BMA to make Bangkok a sustainable city.

He stated that the environmental problems cannot wait and solving this problem requires the help and power of every citizen. For him, Every person will be the key to helping solve the environmental problem successfully and progress shows as it took Yokohama a decade to successfully reduce household waste. This is a result of realising the fact that the people hold the power in the responsibility of the environment and from now on, Yokohama City will cooperate more closely with BMA to fight this issue.

This developing relationship will help solve problems in both countries and allow them to become leaders or representatives of the Asian region in solving various environmental and world problems.

Dr Takeharu concludes “Today I am glad to see a large number of students joining the activities because they will be an important force and the main force in helping solve various problems in the future. Therefore, we must ask for cooperation from all students in jointly solving environmental problems. Let’s go together.”

Press Release