Instead of paying big money to visit such places, you just have to visit the National Science Museum Organisation at Technopolis in Patum Thani, where a variety of ecosystems from around the world will be on offer for you.

To stimulate people through a lifelong learning system, the National Science Museum Organisation, which operates the country's science museum, is working on a new project to build a Bt2-billion museum to showcase the world's ecosystems.

Called Bio World, the museum is designed to highlight the importance of environmental issues in the 21st century. This will be the organisation's fourth museum, following the Science Museum, the Natural Science Museum and the upcoming IT Museum.

The establishment of Bio World Museum will fulfil the aim of making the entire area around the four museums into the country's largest scientific-learning complex.

According to the organisation's president Pichai Sonchaeng, the organisation has allocated 50 rai to build the new museum, which would simulate the world's ecosystems and allow people to explore and learn about each of them and their bio-diversity in a real-life situation.

In the new museum, he said the organisation planned to build three key ecosystems - a North American temperate forest, an Asian tropical forest and the freezing Arctic-Antarctic plains.

"We plan to build all the ecosystems on 50,000 square metres and we will put everything in each ecosystem to resemble the natural one as closely as possible," he added.

Automatic temperature and humidity control systems would also be required to provide changeable climates for each region and to simulate the change of seasons so that people could sense it as if it was real.

Built upon the concept of "Sharing our Planet", Pichai said people would be able to learn about biology and see relations among living things such as plants and animals in the ecosystem. They could also see simulated environments from the underwater world to the highest mountain.

Since the project requires big investment, the president said the organisation was open to international joint investment. Currently it is in talks with related museum organisations in several countries including England, France and Canada, to become joint investors.

"As the Bio World museum requires technological knowledge for its establishment and operation, working with international organisations will help us get experience and help the museum operate smoothly," he said.

He added that the organisation hoped to conclude the negotiations with foreign investors this year, and it planned to begin the feasibility study next year.

Under the plan, it will take around three to four years for implementation and the new museum is expected to open in 2011.

The organisation believes that all the museums will help turn the country's scientific learning centre into reality. It also hopes that this centre would not only become an exploration destination for local people, but also become a highly developed attraction for international visitors.

Pongpen Sutharoj

The Nation