Disasters and emergency response

As floodwaters across the country remain high after almost two weeks of flooding, tens of thousands of families are still waiting in unsanitary comnditions for emergency supplies such as food and water. But while help trickles down to affected communities, aid groups have begun to question ...

Phnom Penh–Cambodia’s rice exports to foreign countries this year will fall short from the amount that was expected earlier, due to the flooding, said President of the Federation of Cambodian Rice Millers Association Phou Puy on Tuesday. The flooding has hit the country since August, will ...

Three percent of the country’s rice crops have been destroyed by flooding in provinces along the Mekong River and around the Tonle Sap lake, and another seven percent is at risk of being lost, the minister of agriculture said yesterday. New government estimates also show that ...

As severe flooding continues to plague provinces along the Mekong River and around the Tonle Sap lake, new figures released by aid groups and officials yesterday showed that the scale of the disaster is far bigger than initially expected and could be worse than Typhoon ...

Flooding has affected 90,303 families and flooded 83,007 houses nationwide, while 13,402 families have been evacuated so far from inundated areas, Minister of Information Khieu Kanharith said Monday. Citing data from the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM), Mr Kanharith also said in a posting to ...

An emergency cabinet meeting has been called for today to discuss disaster response and prevention in the face of severe flooding that has hit many parts of the country. More than 132,000 hectares of rice paddy field have been inundated with water since flooding began earlier ...

Continuing flooding along the Mekong River and around the Tonle Sap lake is taking a severe toll on local communities, government officials said Friday, as they released preliminary figures showing that 62 people had been killed in the floods, 5,000 families had been displaced, and ...

The company constructing a dam in Koh Kong province, where seven workers were swept away in floodwaters earlier this month, has paid US$1,000 to the families of each of the men for funeral expenses, but is denying responsibility for the incident, an official said yesterday. Sok ...

Amid forecasts that provinces around the Mekong River could see further flooding, government officials, donors and NGO workers met yesterday to discuss the risks posed by natural disasters and climate change. Rafael Dochao Moreno, charge d’affaires of the European Union Delegation, warned that Cambodia is already ...

Three families have lodged complaints against China National Heavy Machinery Co after a storm at the company’s hydropower dam project in Koh Kong province on September 10 swept away a group of workers, leaving two dead and five missing, rights group Adhoc said yesterday. Neang Boratino, ...

Eight workers at the Stung Tatay hydro project, in Koh Kong province, are presumed dead after being swept away by floodwaters on Sunday. Seven of the men drowned while trying to rescue a colleague who had fainted after floodwaters swept over a bridge, stranding him at ...

Heavy flooding during the rainy season, affecting 10 out of 17 provinces in Laos, has underlined the need for stronger disaster-management efforts, experts say. Tropical storm Haima struck central and northern parts of the country on June 24, with Nock-10 hitting central and southern areas on ...

The Xayaburi dam project in Northern Laos might increase the probability of earthquakes in a region already prone to seismic activity, according to a recently translated report from Vietnam. The 1260-megawatt project sits about 100 kilometres south of the Lai Chau-Dien fault line. Construction activity on the ...

HCM CITY – A workshop to develop disaster management capacity for the four Lower Mekong countries of Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Viet Nam by encouraging collaborative efforts through dialogue and information exchange opened yesterday in HCM City. The five-day Lower Mekong Initiative (LMI) Disaster Management workshop, ...

Cambodia was ranked the ninth most at risk country of being exposed to natural disasters out of 173 countries surveyed in a new report by the UN University’s Institute for Environment and Human Security A UNDP report released in August supported the World Risk report’s findings ...

Almost  650,000 hectares of ecologically-rich flooded forest surrounding the Tonle Sap lake has been protected by a sub-decree signed by Prime Minister Hun Sen on Monday. The 647,406 hectare area spans sections of Kampong Chhnang, Pursat, Battambang, Banteay Meanchey, Siem Reap and Kampong Thom provinces. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Monday signed off on a sub-decree that officially created a 640,000-hectare protected zone covering the flooded forest and floodplains of Tonle Sap lake. The sub-decree determined that 647,406 hectares of flooded forest around Tonle Sap lake in Kompong Chhnang, Pursat, ...

The wet season had come and gone with almost no rain. Despite the best efforts of the farmers from Tralach commune, in Takeo province’s Traing district, widespread crop failures two years ago brought the community to the economic, and dietary, brinkThis week, farmers in Kratie ...

Cambodia has met 82 percent of its expected 250,000 hectares of cultivated rice after rains have relieved the drought struck province of Battambang. 400 hectares is all that remains still at risk, a small section of the 10,000 rice growing hectares in the province.  According ...

Four districts and over a thousand families are facing a drought in Battambang province. More rain is needed as approximately 70 percent of the province’s 250,000 hectares of rice paddies have been planted. Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries chief of the rice department Ngin ...

Rice growing provinces such as Battambang, Kandal and Takeo are suffering a drought as monsoon rains have not affected the areas. Harvests are expected to fail or fall short of expectations if rain does not fall on the farmland within the next few weeks. 2,000 ...

WikiLeaks has recently released US diplomatic cables that show that the there was no warning system along the Sesan river in Ratanakkiri province for floods in 2007. There have been many complaints by the communities along the river of the floods caused by dams along ...