Forest cover

Prime Minister Hun Sen ordered police to arrest anyone – including government officials – involved with the deforestation of the flooded forests surrounding the Tonle Sap Lake because it is an area important to the spawning of many species of fish, among other reasons. ... ...

Preah Vihear provincial authorities on Thursday cracked down on four illegal processing shops in Tbeng Meanchey district and confiscated more than 2,000 cubic metres of non-timber forest products. ... ...

In a bid to stop and prevent forest land encroachment in Preah Monivong Bokor National Park in Kampot province, the Ministry of Environment has equipped rangers with drones to assist them in their patrol, intervention and crackdown in a timely and effective manner. ... ...

Forestry administration officers went to seize slabs of illegally logged timber from a cashew plantation in Thala Bori Vat district, Stung Treng on August 10. ... ...

Sre Ambel district authorities in Koh Kong province are investigating a case involving a former district police chief who is allegedly encroaching on forest land in Dang Peng commune’s Veal Pouch village. ... ...

Kampong Chhang provincial police have been investigating five people who are alleged to have secretly cleared and encroached on flooded forest land in separate locations covering nearly 10ha in Chhnok Trou commune’s Ses Slap village of Boribor district.​​ ... ...

In the first six months of this year, rangers from the Ministry of Environment went on 14,422 patrols in protected natural areas and biodiversity corridors, investigated 4,238 cases of natural resource offences, imposed fines in 511 of those cases and sent 515 of the cases ...

A joint working group of the Preah Sihanouk Provincial Administration is inspecting a site at Bak Kang Mountain, which was designated state public property in 2002 but is now being cleared by a private company. ... ...

Kampong Speu provincial governor Vei Samnang has issued an order prohibiting clearing and settling on more than 281ha of state forest land in two locations after some residents illegally occupied and farm the land. ... ...

Mondulkiri provincial governor Svay Sam Eang urged officials and local authorities to intensify efforts to prevent forest crimes and illegal logging as these activities have increased. ... ...

Svay Leu district forestry administration office in Siem Reap province has given a month’s notice to the owners of homemade tractors impounded last week for transporting illegal timber. Authorities warned that if no action was taken the administration would take the case to court. ... ...

Forestry crimes including logging, poaching and encroachment on state forest land for private ownership increased considerably last year despite stricter law enforcement, according to an annual report by the Ministry of Environment. ... ...

The National Committee for the Prevention and Crackdown of Natural Resource Crimes still claims there are no large-scale forest crimes in the Kingdom, despite forest activists saying that logging is taking place because people are unemployed. ... ...

Illegal loggers have cleared 30-hectares of community forest land, close to the site of thousands of natural stone pillars in Mondulkiri province, felling hundreds of trees and leaving the area barren. ... ...

Police in Pursat province arrested a high-ranking military officer on Monday, accusing him of encroaching and clearing around 40 hectares of the state’s protected forest areas in Veal Veng district.​ ... ...

The provinces of Kampong Chhnang and Koh Kong yesterday guaranteed legal action against any individual found guilty of encroaching on or engaging in illicit land trade within state-protected forests. ... ...

Preah Sihanouk provincial governor Kuoch Chamroeun on Sunday warned that criminals destroying mangrove forests to occupy state land will face strict legal repercussions. The warning came as he attended the replanting of mangroves on 2ha that had been destroyed in Tuol Totoeng commune’s Chumpu Khmao ...

Ratanakkiri provincial and O’Yadav district police forces seized 30 logs of mixed timber from a plantation in Pak Nhay commune’s Lom village on Sunday. Police suspect traders hid the logs at the plantation while they waited to transport them to be sold in Vietnam. ... ...

The University of Copenhagen’s open letter used data from the University of Maryland’s Global Forest Change dataset and other data points to show that 7,510 hectares of forestland were lost at the Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary in 2019, the worst loss since 2016 when the ...

The Environment Ministry yesterday refuted a claim by Wildlife Alliance that more than 200 hectares of mangrove forest had been cleared inside protected areas in Koh Kong province’s Peam Krasaop Wildlife Sanctuary. ... ...

The Wildlife Alliance yesterday discovered over 200 hectares of mangrove forests within Koh Kong province’s Peam Krasaop Wildlife Sanctuary were illegally cleared. ... ...

Major-general Chan Sam Ath was found guilty of violating the Forestry Law by the Stung Treng Provincial Court on Wednesday, but he will not be imprisoned because of poor health due to abdominal surgery. ...  ...

Forest activists claimed they had observed more cases of deforestation in the Prey Lang area than before the Covid-19 outbreak. They alleged that three companies had sent workers to log and transport timber with no crackdown by the relevant authorities. ... ...

The Ministry of Environment on Tuesday slammed a report by a local organisation which claimed the Prey Lang forest has lost 40,000ha in the last 18 years. Ministry of Environment spokesman Neth Pheaktra called the report by the Prey Lang Community Network (PLCN) “politically motivated” ...