Environment and natural resources

A new plan to protect the environment started taking shape yesterday when the Environment Ministry held a workshop to discuss ideas on how to convert numerous laws into a single code to govern the county’s natural resources. It is expected the process will take two years ...

A controversial proposed animal swap that would have seen elephants Kiri and Seila sent from the notorious Teuk Chhou Zoo in Kampot to a zoo in Japan in exchange for other exotic species has been officially called off, new documents show.   ...

Eight tigers will be released into the Cambodian wild in an unprecedented plan projected to cost between $20 and $50 million, the Ministry of Agriculture and WWF-Cambodia announced at an event in Phnom Penh on Wednesday.   ...

A 30-month study by Vietnamese researchers on the impact of 11 proposed hydroelectric dams in the Lower Mekong Basin (LMB) has found that the economic damage to Cambodia alone will be worth some $450 million per year. ...

At what should be a boom time ahead of the New Year, seafood vendors in Kampot have full baskets but no buyers as the algae bloom around Kep turns the water bright green and dead fish wash ashore. The government has issued a warning against swimming ...

As China opened one of its six dams on the upper Mekong River last month to help parched Southeast Asian countries down river cope with a record drought, it was hailed as benevolent water diplomacy. But to critics of hydroelectric dams built on the Mekong over ...

A massive algal bloom off the coast of Kep that has left scores of dead coastal crabs and fish in its wake resulted in warnings from the Ministry of Environment and Prime Minister Hun Sen this weekend to avoid eating seafood or swimming in the ...

Sleeping in a hammock strung between two tall trees, deep inside Prey Lang forest, environmental activist Phorn Sopheak was startled awake at 1:30 a.m. on Sunday morning when her parked motorbike toppled over onto her body. ...

Protesters from Phnom Penh’s lakeside communities spent an hour facing off with police on Thursday on a road on the former Boeng Kak lake before turning around and taking a different route to the National Assembly, where they demanded an end to the infilling and ...

Security forces on Thursday blocked two mothers and a wife of jailed activists from the environmental group Mother Nature from walking to Prime Minister Hun Sen’s house to protest their family members’ imprisonment, before a representative of the premier’s cabinet chastised them for using the ...

The governments of China, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam have agreed to set up a centre in China where the six countries can work together to find solutions to water resource management problems, the Mekong River Commission said in a statement released yesterday.   ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has agreed to legally protect nearly 1 million hectares of the Kingdom’s forest land, including the Prey Lang forest. Speaking during the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport’s annual meeting at the Institute of Technology of Cambodia, Mr. Hun Sen said he ...

The Ministry of Environment has proposed the government establish nearly one million hectares of newly protected forest, an area that will include the Prey Lang forest, according to ministry spokesman Sao Sopheap.​ ...

A truck transporting corn from Battambang to Prey Vang province was seized by forestry officials on Monday evening after hundreds of turtles and pythons were found stashed inside, according to officials. ...

Police in Tbong Khmum province found more than 4,000 pieces of undocumented rosewood after raiding the home of a commune chief over the weekend but chose not to arrest the official pending further investigation.​ ...

A member of the Prey Lang Community Network (PLCN) in Kratie province was seriously injured after she was attacked by an unknown assailant while sleeping in a hammock on Sunday night near Boeung Cha village. ...

A group of 10 armed soldiers stormed a Forestry Administration office in Oddar Meanchey province on Monday and attempted to seize a military truck that had been confiscated from them after they used it to transport illegal timber, leading to an hourslong standoff, officials said.​ ...

The Environment and Education Ministries will expand their eco-school program to all primary and secondary schools across the country over the course of 2017, provided they have the necessary human and financial resources to do so. ...

The Ministry of Environment is encouraging people living in or around protected areas to start feeding and domesticating wild animals, and to abstain from eating them, with similar strategies in animal conservation being attempted in communities in Preah Vihear province. ...

The amount of water that will be released from a Chinese dam until 10 April could be too low to help alleviate drought-stricken South-East Asia. ...

Up to 4,000 mostly ethnic minority people in Mondulkiri’s Keo Seima district are facing a water shortage after the local supplier announced service would be suspended due to impending widescale drought. ...

Though praised by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, China’s release of Mekong River water from the Jinghong dam on March 15 is unlikely to bring much relief to downstream countries like Cambodia, water experts said yesterday.   ...

With the inaugural Lancang-Mekong Cooperation (LMC) leaders’ meeting scheduled to open next week in China, Cambodia said the LMC is important for all Lancang-Mekong countries to maintain regional peace and stability and to boost economic development. ...

Farmers and development organizations say they welcome the release of water from a hydropower dam on the Mekong River in China, but warn against negative effects if too much is discharged. ...