Protected forest

A section of protected mangrove forest in Koh Kong that in December was discovered to have been filled with sand was illegally sold to tycoon Chea Leanghong in 2017, documents show, with local authorities having signed off on the deal. ...

Nearly 400 members of the Prey Lang Community Network will hold the annual Prey Lang ceremony in late March to commemorate and preserve indigenous identities and promote the forest’s potential. Meanwhile, Prey Lang activists have claimed illegal logging still exists in the area, even though the ...

A 55-year-old Vietnamese man was charged by Kampong Thom Provincial Court yesterday for illegally clearing more than six hectares of land in a protected forest. Provincial military police officer Keo Savoeun identified the suspect as Nguyen Duc Nhan, an excavator driver for a Vietnamese rubber plantation ...

A Virgin Atlantic representative yesterday said that the British airline is no longer purchasing carbon credits from an area of Oddar Meanchey province set aside for a UN REDD+ program after a report describing widespread problems. ...

A REDD Programme representative yesterday said it would be concerning if recent claims of the military systematically clearing protected forest in Oddar Meanchey province covered under the scheme proved true – though a third-party company has dismissed the claims as outdated. ...

The Ministry of Environment has appealed to authorities and the community to protect a temple discovered in Prey Lang forest in Kampong Thom province’s Sandan district. Minister of Environment Say Sam Al lead a delegation to visit Trapaing Prers temple in Prey Lang forest last ...

Illegal logging within the Prey Lang protected forest decreased significantly year-on-year over a six-month period ending in February, collected data show, though forest-clearing in the area remains rampant. ...

Villagers and NGOs have accused local authorities, including forestry and environmental officials, of accepting bribes from illegal loggers in exchange for unfettered logging expeditions in Preah Vihear province’s Preah Roka protected forest. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has called on the Agriculture Ministry to do more to prevent land grabbing in the country’s endangered flooded forests.Speaking at the closing ceremony of the Agriculture Ministry’s annual meeting yesterday, Mr. Hun Sen said encroachment risks wiping out fish populations that ...

Mondulkiri’s provincial governor yesterday said officials are investigating allegations of the clearing of 200 to 300 hectares of protected forestland in Keo Seima district. ...

A Forestry Administration official said yesterday that authorities have filed a court complaint accusing a commune chief in Kampong Thom province of clearing protected state forestland for private sale. ...

The government has reversed course on a controversial decision to downsize the proposed boundaries of a long-awaited protected area for the beleaguered Prey Lang Forest, the largest lowland evergreen forest left in Southeast Asia.   ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has signed a sub-decree to mark 18 protected areas over nearly three million hectares of land across Prey Lang forest, according to a Ministry of Environment statement released yesterday. ...

A landmark decision by Cambodian prime minister Hun Sen could see almost a million hectares of forest reclassified as protected areas in a country with one of the highest deforestation rates in the world.​ But the order, circulated on Friday, to transfer control of the sites ...

The core of one of Cambodia’s most important and abused forests —Prey Lang—was officially de­clared a protected area this week af­ter years of campaigning by local ac­tivists and foreign conservationists.    ...

The Ministry of Environment conducted a workshop yesterday to discuss the government’s plan to designate five forest areas, totaling about one million hectares of land, as protected. ...

The Ministry of Environment has given two NGOs the go-ahead to implement their proposed management plans for five protected community forest areas in Battambang and Pursat provinces, projected to cover 1,064 families and 2,761 hectares.   ...

Making a dramatic arrival by helicopter at the Sofitel Hotel in Phnom Penh after a flyover of Prey Lang forest, Environment Minister Say Sam Al and US Ambassador to Cambodia William Heidt discussed a plan to make the Kingdom’s largest forest a protected area. ...

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. ...

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.​ ...

Local authorities say they are struggling to protect the Mondulkiri Protected Forest and the Phnom Prich Wildlife Sanctuary from being logged by villagers in the province’s Koh Nhek and Pech Chreada districts, while villagers accuse authorities of colluding with certain logging groups. ...

The government’s Apsara authority will join forces with the Preah Vihear administration to establish a joint committee to prevent illegal logging and to manage state land in the protected areas around Koh Ker, officials said yesterday. ...

After years of land-grabbing that has eroded a protected forest in Battambang Province, forestry administration officials took a forceful step yesterday to crack down on the problem. In the early hours of the morning, a team from the forestry administration alongside local police entered the ...