Environment and natural resources

Exports of fish fell in the first four months of 2017, but income from the fisheries sector increased by nearly half compared with the same period last year. According to an Agriculture Ministry report, income from the fisheries sector between January and April was $230,653, up ...

More than 60 cows and buffalo in Stung Treng’s Siem Pang district have died over the past two weeks following a foot-and-mouth disease outbreak, while 200 cattle have been vaccinated to prevent further spread, officials said yesterday.​ ...

A national police spokesman yesterday said a report alleging that tycoon Kith Meng’s Royal Group was colluding with loggers to launder timber was mistakenly posted on the body’s official site by a “tired” employee who meant to share the information with local reporters but not ...

The government is looking at ways to tackle Cambodia’s waste problem with a $1 charge on airline tickets touted to raise the cash. The move comes after footage emerged showing the capital’s canals remain clogged with rubbish a year after video of the pollution was shown ...

More than 400 pieces of luxury thnong wood suspected to be felled by a local community were seized by authorities in Pursat province’s Phnom Samkos Wildlife Sanctuary on Thursday following a tip-off from a local reporter. ...

In a tributary in Phnom Penh’s Phum Prek Toal district that flows into Boeng Tompun, a mountain of plastic, garbage and waste has built up to the point where it stifles the water from flowing. Embattled residents who live next to the pile of waste ...

A representative of business mogul Kith Meng’s Royal Group yesterday hit back at a report published by the National Police accusing the company of laundering illegal timber through the Lower Sesan II hydro power project. ...

The U.K. NGO that last week exposed a major new timber trafficking operation between Cambodia and Vietnam has released more evidence in hopes of supporting Phnom Penh’s investigation into its claims, including invoices from Cambodia-based companies breaking the country’s timber export ban. ...

Police officers, gendarmes and Forestry Administration officials yesterday discovered a large cache of valuable, illegally felled wood – which locals say was destined for Vietnam – after raiding a house in Stung Treng province linked to a prominent timber trader. ...

Authorities in Svay Rieng province on Wednesday said the latest outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease had been brought under control by timely treatment, though their numbers on how many cows the contagious virus had infected varied wildly.Meas Sok, chief of Svay Chrum district’s Chhoeuteal commune, said ...

One of four new mining exploration permits, advertised publicly this week, is within the Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary map, coordinates reveal, sparking concern among activists and community members about the strength of the forest’s recently-acquired protected status.In the first public tender of fresh exploration licenses ...

After spending the last three months under the watchful eye of their own personal retinue of bodyguards, nine endangered royal turtles successfully broke free from their shells on Tuesday and were transferred to the Koh Kong Reptile Conservation Centre, where they will be raised. ...

Fourteen community representatives speaking for thousands of families yesterday petitioned the South Korean Embassy, Environment Ministry and Forestry Administration to halt the expansion of a controversial “reforestation” project by a Korean company situated between the protected Prey Lang forest and Mekong River. Their petition – ...

An environmental ranger and a village chief were questioned yesterday by the Pailin Provincial Court for allegedly colluding to grab, clear and sell land in a protected area supported by the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation, according to officials. ...

Authorities intercepted four trucks carrying 81 pieces of illegal luxury timber at a checkpoint in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Yadav district last Friday, District Military Police Commader Sok Min said yesterday. ...

The Mekong River Commission held its second stakeholder meeting on Laos’s controversial proposed Pak Beng dam on Friday, giving involved parties the opportunity to hear responses to concerns raised at the first meeting in February. ...

Cambodian and Vietnamese officials have received millions of dollars in bribes from Vietnamese timber traders as part of a cross-border “conspiracy” to log vast swathes of Ratanakkiri province and funnel the timber to Vietnam, according to a damning report by the Environmental Investigation Agency released ...

Villagers in Preah Vihear’s Choam Ksan district confronted a group of soldiers, preventing them from felling timber in their community forest by confiscating one of their trucks, a local official said yesterday. ...

A conservation NGO official yesterday said he planned to ask microfinance lenders to better scrutinise their loans after a spate of cases over the last month showed that such loans had been used by illegal loggers to purchase chainsaws and tractors for transporting timber. ...

According to the boats’ inhabitants, who raise fish underneath their floating homes in Russei Keo district’s Chraing Chamreh I commune, the move was prompted by a mass die-off of fish last weekend due to increasing water temperatures.  ...

More than a tonne of rosewood and the plateless car carrying it were seized in Oddar Meanchey province yesterday after authorities received a report about a Vietnamese woman and her workers trying to set the vehicle on fire. ...

Environment Ministry officials in Ratanakkiri province are hunting for timber traders who on Sunday set ablaze 300 logs of luxury wood in Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary, one of several protected areas raided by Vietnamese loggers in recent months. ...

Police in Ratanakkiri province Thursday’stopped a bus and arrested two Vietnamese men—the driver and a bus company employee—who were attempting to transport about 300 kg of luxury-grade timber across the border to Vietnam, officials said. ...

Around 600 hectares of the protected Southern Cardamom National Park in Koh Kong have been illegally cleared and sold off for cultivation since 2013, sometimes by local authorities, according to the conservation organisation Wildlife Alliance. ...