Forestry Administration Fights Logging with Wedding Gardens

27 March 2013
The Cambodia Daily
Economic land concessions and plantations / Environment and natural resources / Environmental and biodiversity protection / Ethnic minorities and indigenous people / Forest classifications / Forest products / Forests and forestry / Land / Land policy and administration / Logging and timber / National parks and wildlife sanctuaries / Protected areas / Social development
Beng tree / forest cover / Forestry Administration / green zones / illegal logging / Karki tree / kratie / Kratie Province / Neag tree / Nuon tree / O'russi Kandal commune / rosewood trees / Siem Bok district / Stung Treng / Stung Treng Province / wedding gardens

As the remains of the county’s forests fall to rapacious illegal loggers and to make way for the government-awarded economic land concessions, officials tasked with forestry protection are hoping newlywed couples can build a last line of defense. “Wedding gardens”- green spaces where newly-married couples are encouraged to plant a sapling in order to promote the protection of the country’s forests- have been opened in Stung Treng province and another in neighbouring Kratie provinces. In Stung Treng, the forestry administration has set up a nursery that contains saplings including those which produce luxury wood such as the rosewood trees Beng, Neag Nuon, and Karki. … Camboda’s estimated forest cover-a blunt indicator, which does not detail the quality of the forests records- has declined from about 73 percent in the 1960s to about 57 percent currently.

 Kuch Naren, P.20
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