23,000 Hectares of Land Concessions Approved
The government last month granted four companies a total 23,000 hectares of land concessions for agro-industry projects and a special economic zone (SEZ), according to human rights groups, which said it obtained the information from government documents. An additional 500 hectares inside a wildlife sanctuary were also handed out for an eco-tourism project. The concessions are part of the government’s rapid sell-off of Cambodia’s land and forests, an approach that has now given agro-industrial firms control of about 2.1 million hectares, and which activists say has led to hundreds of land disputes and soaring deforestation rates. …
