CPAmedia News - January 2003

Associates:

We are very pleased to announce that CPAmedia associate writer Bertil Lintner, who is already Asia Correspondent for Svenska Dagbladet and a long-term Senior Writer for Far Eastern Economic Review, has recently been appointed Senior Writer specialising in East Asian Affairs for the Wall Street Journal. For more information visit his website at: www.asiapacificms.com

Photography:

Ron Emmons completed the first stage of Rough Guides current update of Vietnam, visiting areas between Hanoi and the northern frontier, including Sapa, in November and December 2002. He is currently shooting and researching in Saigon and the Mekong Delta region.

Rainer Krack completed a successful shoot of Sri Lanka in December, visiting Jaffna and other areas off-limits to visitors for more than twenty years. He found Jaffna Town less damaged than he had anticipated, but reports that the fort is severely damaged and the countryside around Jaffna widely devastated.

Updating and New Books:

CPAmedia completed updates of Insight Guide Southeast Asia and Insight Pocket Guide Chiang Mai in December 2002 and January 2003. New projects underway include an update of Insight Compact Guide Maui and Insight Guide Laos and Cambodia, as well as an update of AA / Fodor Explorer China.

Other Publications:

Just Out: CPAmedia associate writer Ronald D. Renard has just published an authoritative account of Thailand's struggle to eradicate illicit opium production over the last three decades. The work, published under the auspices of the United Nations International Drug Control Programme, is entitled Opium Reduction in Thailand 1970-2000 A Thirty Year Journey (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2001).

Dr Renard relates a valuable, timely and little-known story of how Thailand has effectively reduced the production of opium inside its borders, from 245,600 kilos of opium in 1965 to under 4,000 kilos by the turn of the century.