Presentation of the Project at the 2nd Thai Australian Business Studies Conference

After the return from our fieldwork in Thailand, we had to prepare to host a Thai-Australian Studies conference at RMIT University. The idea of the conference is to bring together delegates who are interested in business and community development from ASEAN nations and Australia.

Our research team also hosted a conference dinner with RMIT's Centre for Business Education Research on the first night of the conference. The dinner was well attended by delegates from Burapha University, Chulalong korn University, Monash, RMIT and the University of Melbourne.

At the second day of the conference, we organised a forum on gender and mining industry and shared our experiences on mining and development project with DFAT, our field trips in Lao PDR and Thailand. We also presented preliminary findings from Thailand, focusing on stories from Tub Klor and relationship between mining MNC and women in the community. The presentation was well reviewed and attended by young researchers from various disciplines.

At the end of the 2nd Thai Australian Business Studies conference, we were confirmed by a number of participants that the value of our research project can go beyond economics and management area. In fact, those from health, cultural studies and community development also show strong interest in the project and help us to think of new directions to promote this project to policy makers in Australia, Thailand and Lao PDR.