Walk through any mall in Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok or Jakarta and the future of consumption gleams back through glass. Smartphones are replaced annually, electric scooters are on every corner, and cars carry charging ports instead of exhaust pipes.
South-East Asia is electrifying and modernising at extraordinary speed. Yet behind the shine of progress sits a question that policymakers should pay more attention to: What happens when all of this needs to be thrown away?
With that the article in The Star noted that Governments today celebrate cleaner transport and rising renewable adoption. Across the Asean-6 automotive market (Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam and Singapore), electric and hybrid vehicles accounted for roughly 13% of passenger sales in 2024 (about 351,000 units).
Singapore is well ahead of the pack, it says, with nearly two-thirds of new cars now electric or hybrid. Vietnam and Thailand hover at around 25%, with Malaysia gathering pace. Between January and October 2025, Malaysia registered 31,273 electric vehicles (EVs), already more than the entirety of 2024.
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