Deforestation drivers

The ASEAN region lost about 33 per cent of its mangrove forests between 1980 and 2020, a decrease of more than 63,000sq km, said the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity (ACB). Nations that comprise ASEAN have just around 43,000sq km of mangrove forests remaining. The ACB statement was ...

While Ministry of Environment officials claim they and relevant departments implement forest protection and conservation measures responsibly, forest protection activists have expressed frustration over their inability to participate in patrols where illegal logging took place. The activists complained they are barred from forest protection efforts and ...

Inspectors have identified 41 factories built on 72 ha of land allocated for forest cultivation in Dong Nai Province ten years ago. The factories all belong to Phuoc Tan Industrial Park (IP) in Bien Hoa Town of Dong Nai that borders Ho Chi Minh City. The violation ...

The number of illegal logs seized in the first nine months of the fiscal year shows that timber smuggling remains rampant in Sagaing Region despite the threat of COVID-19, the head of the regional Forest Department said.  U Aung Tun Win, director of the department, said ...

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen released an open letter Thursday reporting a 73 percent increase in deforestation in 2019 at the Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary, compared to 2018, while criticizing the government’s ban on certain patrolling operations. The University of Copenhagen’s open letter used data ...

A total of 36 rai of forest on Sankalakhiri mountain range in Chanae district of this southern province has been illegally cleared by encroachers, forest protection officials said. Acting on information from local villagers, Gen Jatuporn Kalampasut, director of the intelligence office of the Region 4 ...

Indigenous groups and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) on Thursday dismissed a recent directive from Cambodia’s government ordering local authorities to end illegal logging, calling the move a “show” aimed at mending its reputation of being too soft on forest crimes. On June 19, Minister of Agriculture Veng ...

Myanmar’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation has disputed the London-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)’s latest report which claims illegal teak from Myanmar is being shipped to Europe through the black market. “All the teak we export is legal,” U Kyaw Zaw Oo, the deputy ...

A surge in deforestation alerts from Cambodia’s Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary has raised fresh concerns over the role of a controversial timber firm in illegal logging. The 34,000-hectare (17,000 acre) Think Biotech concession was approved in 2012 under an agreement between Cambodia and South Korea aiming ...

It takes particularly cynical government officials to use the world’s focus on tackling COVID-19 to accelerate illegal logging of protected forests; simultaneously lining the pockets of business elites, attacking environmental activists, and sabotaging its own ability to fight the climate emergency. Yet this is exactly ...