Environment and natural resources

The Mekong River and flash floods have killed at least 152 people and affected 418,770 families in 20 provinces in Cambodia, disaster control officials said Friday. Pon Narith, Secretary General of the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM), said floods have hit the country twice this ...

At around 6 p.m. in Phnom Penh each evening, about 5,000 large brown bats, having spent the day dangling upside down from a tree at Wat Phnom, spread their huge wings and fly out to begin their nightly search for fruit. And as useful and ...

As the director of one of Cam­bodia’s largest breweries, Malay­sian businessman Goh Nan Kioh has made millions selling Angkor Beer to Cambodians. But now his latest business venture, a controversial mainstream Mekong dam in Laos, is drawing the ire of environmentalists who believe that it will ...

Riun Pau ran out of food last week. For the 13-year-old and her family, that moment was the culmination of weeks of distress caused by flooding that had already ravaged their Battambang home and farmland. Pau’s neighbours are experiencing similar problems. In Battambang, 67.3 per cent ...

As floodwaters begin to recede, the extent of the humanitarian crisis and infrastructural damage is slowly being revealed, and in many places the situation is potentially worse than it was following the de­vastating floods in 2011, according to the National Com­mit­tee for Dis­as­ter Management (NCDM). Keo Vy, ...

Flooding has affected close to 287,000 hectares of rice fields, with about 27,800 considered damaged beyond repair, according to government statistics released on Monday. The data from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries reveal that rising waters have affected about 11 per cent of the ...

About 50 ethnic Jarai families in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Yadaw district have sold their farmland and part of the forests their culture depends on to the sister of former Finance Minister Keat Chhon, rights group Adhoc said Monday. Last year, the ethnic minority Jarai in the district ...

Conditions are deteriorating for hundreds of inmates that were forced by flooding to move to the already overcrowded Battambang and Siem Reap prisons from Banteay Meanchey prison, and human rights groups are not sure how long it will be before the prison is operational again, ...

The case of journalist Hang Serei Odom, who was found hacked to death and stuffed into the trunk of his Toyota Camry in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Chum district on September 11 last year, will be heard by the Appeal Court in Phnom Penh, a senior court ...

For the ethnic Bunong people in this northeastern province, animals are an integral part of the local economy. Pigs, chickens and water buffaloes offer a variety of sustenance and labour. But it’s the elephants that bring foreigners – and foreigners bring cash. “When I get tours, the ...

The death toll from Mekong River and flash floods in Cambodia has risen to 122 in the past four weeks, a senior disaster control official said Monday. “To date, the floods have killed 122 people and affected some 1.5 million people,” Nhim Vanda, vice-president of the ...

The coming cassava harvest is increasingly threatened by flooding as about 25 per cent of the crop in prime growing provinces is or has been submerged, according to authorities. Taking up more cultivated area than any other crop in Cambodia except for rice, cassava is especially ...

Surging floodwaters led officials to declare a state of emergency at a commune in Banteay Meanchey province on Saturday night after the Trapaing Thma reservoir expanded an estimated 200 metres. Many of some 2,000 families living close to the Khmer Rouge-era reservoir in Phnom Srok district ...

As monthlong flooding that has so far left 122 dead slowly subsides, officials and relief agencies were on Sunday concerned that a powerful typhoon approaching Vietnam may bring more heavy rain and the risk of more floods to provinces where tens of thousands of families ...

Flooding is a perennial pain in Cambodia, the low-lying, deeply impoverished nation squeezed between Thailand and Vietnam. About this time each year, rivers swell, lakes expand and villages sink beneath soupy brown waters. But this year’s flooding woes are proving particularly miserable. More than 100 are dead, ...

Developing the Don Sahong dam on the Hou Sahong channel of the Mekong River in Champassak province does not breach the 1995 Mekong Agreement, a senior government official has told local media. Deputy Minister of Energy and Mines, Mr Viraphonh Viravong, made the comment on Thursday, ...

The Prey Lang Community Network of anti-logging activists announced yesterday that late last month it had accepted the Alexander Soros Foundation’s $25,000 Award for Extraordinary Achievement in Environmental and Human Rights Activism on behalf of slain environmental crusader Chut Wutty. ...

Floods have submerged a prison in northwestern Banteay Meanchey province on Thursday, forcing the authorities to evacuate all 842 prisoners to detention centers in other provinces. “The prison is badly inundated and we are moving the prisoners to prisons in neighboring provinces,” Phin Sophal, chief of ...

A day after the Cambodia National Mekong Committee (CNMC) received impact assessment documents from Laos for their controversial Don Sahong dam, Cambodian and Vietnamese officials criticized Laos’ lack of transparency on the mainstream Mekong dam. Located less than 1 km from the Lao-Cambodian border, the 240-MW ...

With pant legs rolled up to his knees, Hoeuy Mon trudges through a brown and green patchwork of rice fields. His four hectares are in Tkov village, Prey Veng province, about 300 metres from his home. On most of the journey, walkways enclosing each square plot ...

Floods that have ravaged much of Cambodia may lead to a long-requested extension of voter registration, a National Election Committee official said yesterday. Tep Nytha, NEC secretary-general, said the committee was debating whether to extend the 20-day registration period, which is set to end on October ...

Hundreds of families in Battambang province have been evacuated as authorities ordered a section of a dam to be cut away to release pressure on a reservoir that was threatening to burst and engulf the communities beneath it, as heavy rain continues to cause havoc ...

The National Assembly of Cambodia on Thursday called on national and international charitable groups to provide emergency reliefs to flood-affected people throughout the country, a statement said. The National Assembly of Cambodia on Thursday called on national and international charitable groups to provide emergency reliefs to ...

Raw sewage spewed onto Street 105 from the antiquated discharge canal running parallel to it yesterday as heavy rains continued to create headaches in the capital. The putrid water lipped homes and local business on the street in Chamkarmon’s Boeung Trabek commune, alarming residents. Togo Uchida, ...