Scepticism over social land grants
Nearly a million hectares of land has been granted to ordinary Cambodian citizens through social land concessions (SLC) since May 2012, the government has claimed, though civil society groups have cast doubt on that high figure and questioned how many landless or evicted poor have really benefited from the scheme as intended. The amount of land allegedly given away to families in a less than two-year period is not far off the total 1.23 million hectares of land granted in economic land concessions (ELC) to private firms since 1993, per recent Ministry of Agriculture figures. According to a statement released by the Ministry of Land Management, Urban Planning and Construction in January and obtained by the Post yesterday, the government has given more than 930,000 hectares of land to villagers through SLCs since Prime Minister Hun Sen placed a moratorium on new ELCs in May 2012. … “The ministry has the great honour of informing the public that the government has reclassified and cut a total of more than 930,000 hectares of land to offer to the people,” the statement reads. “Nearly 280,000 hectares has been cut out of 116 economic land concessions, more than 200,000 hectares of land has been cut out of 18 logging concessions and more than 450,000 hectares of land has been cut out of state land and forest land.” …
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/scepticism-over-social-land-grants
