News

The Council of Ministers on Friday signed off on the Lower Sesan 2 dam project in Stung Treng province, despite long-standing criticism leveled against the project by environmental groups who say it would adversely affect 100,000 people as a consequence of reduced access to fish. The ...

Cambodia’s government has approved a controversial hydroelectric dam on a tributary of the Mekong River. The joint venture involves Cambodian, Chinese and Vietnamese investment of $781m (£488m) and is due to be completed within five years. The project in northern Stung Treng province is known as Lower ...

The Finnish government will investigate multinational consulting and engineering firm Pöyry over its involvement in Laos’s Xayaburi dam project, a letter obtained by the Post yesterday reveals. According to the letter from Finland’s Ministry of Employment and the Economy, dated October 16, a complaint filed by ...

The inking of a €300 million contract for water turbines, and job advertisements marked “urgent” appear to be the latest signs that Laos is powering forward with the Xayaburi hydroelectric dam project on the Mekong River. Assurances the $3.8 billion project was on hold pending further ...

Cambodian vegetable farmers say they are being forced to compete with more efficient farmers in Vietnam who use farming techniques to make their vegetables grow faster. Farmers in Sambork Meas, a village on the Mekong River in Mokkompul commune in Bakkeng district in Kandal province, say ...

Scientists and international experts fine-tuning the design of the Xayaboury dam have unveiled a scale model of the planned run-of-river structure to ensure the most efficient level of sediment flushing. The 1:120 scale model simulates actual hydrologic flows and water velocities in the Mekong River at ...

Even as its controversial Xayaburi Dam project is still drawing protest from Mekong river downstream countries such as Cambodia, Laos has inked a deal with South Korean firms to build and operate another large hydropower plant on the Mekong River network. According to the Phnom Penh ...

Fishermen representing five Cambodian communities will publicly express their support for a ban on gillnet use in a ceremony highlighting the importance of the Mekong River Irrawaddy dolphin. The event organised by the Commission for Dolphin Conservation and Development of the Mekong River Dolphin Eco-tourism Zone, ...

The Asian Development Bank is considering providing funds to a controversial 400 megawatt dam project in Laos that could have adverse impacts on the Mekong River in downstream Cambodia. Conservation group International Rivers wants the Lao government to pull the plug on the $1 billion Xe ...

Residents of Kratie province had an education in conservation yesterday as the government and outside partners reiterated a September sub-decree banning gill nets on a sizable stretch of the Mekong in a bid to protect the badly endangered Mekong River dolphin. Touch Seang Tana, head of the Commission ...

Laos has contracted firms to build and operate another significant hydro-power plant on the Mekong River system, adding to the existing furor over potential effects on downstream countries such as Cambodia from the controversial Xayaburi dam. The contracts, reportedly worth $1 billion, are for a series of three dams making ...

Fisheries Administration patrols increased on the Mekong River in Kratie and Stung Treng provinces to prevent fishermen from using dai fishing methods as the seasonal fish migration period begins. However, the Fisheries Action Coalition Team (FACT), an umbrella group of national and international organizations, said the ...

China’s dam building spree on the upper Mekong River raises new tensions over water resources Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang obviously had China in mind when he warned recently that tensions over water resources are not only threatening economic growth but presenting a source of conflict Cambodia, ...

In an effort to boost tourist numbers, the Ministry of Tourism will host an eco-tourism seminar in the northeastern provinces to showcase its main attraction, the Irrawaddy dolphins of the Mekong River. Thong Khon, Minister of Tourism, said last week that officials attempted to hold the eco-tourism seminar ...

Rita O’ Sullivan, ADB Country Director Tourism is a dynamic component in the economic sector. In the Greater Mekong Sub Region – Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia – bound together by the Mekong River, the tourism industry is a driving force, says Rita O’ Sullivan, ...

Cambodians were among anti-Xayaburi dam protesters who demonstrated outside Thai Parliament in Bangkok yesterday, urging Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to halt construction and tear up an agreement to buy the proposed dam’s power. A group of Cambodians travelled to Bangkok especially to raise their concerns about ...

Laos’ energy minister announced last week that the country will sell energy supplied by the controversial Xayaburi Dam to Cambodia. It is already planning to sell power to Thailand, where last month a lawsuit was lodged to stop the country from buying electricity produced at ...

There has been an ioncrease in fishing activity in the dolphin conservation zones along the Mekong River in Kratie and Stung Treng provinces, putting pressure on the critically endangered Mekong dolphin population, the chairman of the Commission for Mekong River Dolphin Conservation and Eco-tourism Development said yesterday. Touch ...

Villagers in Kratie province have long feared the proposed Sambor hydroelectric dam and the impact it could have on their subsistence fishing and riverbank agriculture. According to Resilience on the Mekong: A Vulnerability and Adaptation Assessment in North-East Cambodia, a report released by the World Wildlife Foundation on Friday, ...

The largest hydropower station on Lancang River in southwest China’s Yunnan Province — known as the Mekong River in southeast Asia — went into operation Thursday with its first power generating unit up and running. The Nuozhadu hydroelectric station, located in the city of Pu’er, is ...

A waterfall has been blasted less than two kilometres from the Cambodian-Lao border, beginning work on another unapproved hydroelectric dam on the Mekong river, environmental group International Rivers claimed yesterday. Pianporn Deetes, the Thailand campaign coordinator for International Rivers, said she had learned of the excavation work, near ...

Cambodia has been asked to send a delegation to the site of the proposed Xayaburi hydro-electric dam in northern Laos, Minister of Water Resources and Meteorology Lim Kean Hor said yesterday. Kean Hor, who is also chairman of Cambodia’s National Mekong Committee, said the equivalent body ...

Cambodia would significantly strain its land and water resources if a projected series of large-scale hydro-power dams are built along the Mekong, according to projections released this week. Fish remains the primary source of protein and researchers [from the Australia National University in Canberra and World Wildlife Fund] ...

The economic, social and environmental consequences of the construction of dams on the Mekong River could be devastating.. ANU research suggests that millions of people are in danger of going hungry if the dams proceed. Replacing fish as a protein source with alternative food would use ...