Concessions

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) will finalize its assessment over the companies which have been granted economic land concessions (ELCs), in October, as the ministry has announced to reduce the period of ELC investment to 50 years from 70-99 years, said a ...

Troops assigned to a light infantry unit destroyed village fields in southern Cambodia’s Kampot province on Monday in a bid to expand the property used by a commune set up for retired army soldiers, sources said. ...

Rights and democracy groups say Cambodians are not being protected by the constitution, which has been routinely violated by all three branches of government. Over 170,000 families across the country were hurt by land disputes in 2014, according to a new a report by NGO ...

Cambodian land concessions granted to companies last year affected nearly 80,000 people, displacing many of them and increasing poverty, the NGO Forum on Cambodia says in a new report. ...

Seung Hyung Lee did not know that blocking an excavator with his body would be part of his job description when he came to work in Cambodia. The senior vice-president of developer World City, however, found himself doing just that last week, when construction equipment ...

Police in Koh Kong province arrested and released an activist on Saturday who helped families organize a roadblock against a Chinese company they accuse of stealing their farms. ...

A group of South Koreans and Cambodians employed by a Korean developer faced off with an excavator and a bulldozer clearing land for a wealthy local businessman in a dispute over 6 hectares of land in Phnom Penh’s Russei Keo district on Wednesday. ...

The government has announced a new review of economic land concessions, shortening the period of some from 99 years to 50, but watchdog groups say strict law enforcement of other legislation is also needed. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen once again warned that the royal government will confiscate economic land concession (ELCs) from any private companies that do not implement in accordance to contracts signed with government. ...

About 400 students and a few villagers protested in Phnom Penh on Sunday to demand the release of two men arrested last week after a protest over a land dispute in Kampot province, with authorities claiming that the demonstration was organized by a politician who ...

About 200 people representing 816 families who have been promised a 1,337-hectare land concession in Kampot province protested in Phnom Penh on Monday, just days after authorities began measuring off their land. ...

A new report on illegal logging in Cambodia’s northeastern forests portrays a single company with essentially a monopoly on the illicit trade. Tek Vannara, executive director of NGO Forum, said the report could be a tool to find a solution to combat deforestation. “We ...

The government yesterday slashed the lifespans of 12 economic land concessions (ELC) – by half in some cases – as it continued to implement a new policy capping ELC leases at 50 years. ...

Land concessions for large-scale agricultural plantations are stripping off Cambodia’s forest cover, according to a new report by Forest Trends, a U.S.-based environmental protection group.​ ...

Environment Minister Say Sam Al and a group of NGOs on Monday agreed to cooperate to resolve a years long dispute between hundreds of families in Koh Kong province and a Chinese company they accuse of stealing their land. ...

Forestry officials confiscated 13 cubic meters of illegally logged timber in Stung Treng City on Saturday after discovering the wood hidden in a pond and the surrounding underbrush, an official said Sunday. ...

Officials in Kratie province are insisting that a small group of families involved in a local land dispute register with the Interior Ministry or be “punished.” ...

New houses built for 100 families who were pushed off of their land by the construction of the Sesan Krom II Dam have been slammed as substandard by the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (Adhoc). ...

A group of local and international NGOs are urging the World Bank to include a program for helping the thousands of families evicted from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak neighborhood as part of the plan to start funding new projects in Cambodia. ...

Reinforcing a view that land grabbing is now a business for some rural Cambodians, several villagers who were paid Wednesday for ending their squat on a palm oil plantation reappeared 48 hours later, laying claim to different parts. ...

The Ministry of Land Management has again accused rights group Licadho of spreading false data that shows that the number of families embroiled in new or intensifying land disputes jumped threefold last year. ...

After about 100 villagers on Sunday burned effigies of officials involved in a land dispute in Kompong Chhnang province that has dragged on for nearly a decade, the provincial governor said the protest was “contrary to the law” and gave authorities a reason to arrest ...

After exposure in the press and a brush with military police, a protest leader has fled rural Kampot for Siem Reap province. ...

The analysis, from campaign group Forest Trends, says that large corporations are using legitimate development permits to illegally clear land.Around 2,000 sq km of forests are being lost every year, they say. ...