Local Mass Media’s Attitudes towards Environmental Situations in the East

Abstract

The research aims to study the local mass media’s attitudes toward an environmental situation in the East of Thailand. A Qualitative study with in-depth interviews with key informants who are mass media in the eastern part of Thailand is applied. The informants are asked about their attitudes towards environmental problems in the East. The results are shown in 4 issues as follows: 1. Illegal waste disposal is distributed into waste disposal in other people’s properties and waste disposal into canals, 2. Coastal erosion in Laem Chabang area which is distributed into land loss and potential catch loss, 3. People’s opposition to the town plan amendment which is distributed into the opposition of government’s town plan development and the opposition of the town plan development benefitting the investors, 4. The freshwater conflicts which are distributed into freshwater conflicts between agriculture and industrial sectors and the invasion of the industrial sector into the agricultural area.