Forest cover
Deforestation drivers
Quang Nam to convert forests into hydropower plant, urban area
Nearly 34 ha of planted forests in Quang Nam are to be cleared for the construction of the Song Tranh 4 hydropower plant. Photo by VnExpress/Dac Thanh. Central Quang Nam Province has approved the conversion of nearly 35 hectares of forests into a hydropower plant and ...
Dac Thanh
US Urges Preservation of ‘Incredible Biodiversity’ in Cambodian Forest
The U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh says it is concerned about deforestation in the Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary, where five environmental activists were detained for documenting illegal logging in February. Ambassador Patrick W. Murphy and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Cambodia Mission Director Veena Reddy ...
Sun Narin
Cambodia denies reports of large scale illegal logging
CAMBODIA had denied reports by Amnesty International and the Prey Lang Community Network (PLCN) that large scale illegal logging has increased in the Prey Lang wildlife sanctuary. The Ministry of Environment has rejected reports by the two groups, saying it was an attempt to cause conflict ...
New Straits Times
Cambodia: Widespread illegal logging in Prey Lang rainforest amid ban on community patrols
Widespread illegal logging and the repression of environmental activism are among the grave threats to Cambodia’s Prey Lang rainforest, Amnesty International said today, one year after authorities banned environmental defenders from entering the Prey Lang wildlife sanctuary. Recent images and remote sensing data reviewed by Amnesty ...
Nearly 3K illegal burn sites identified across Kingdom
Illegal burning of rice stubble and land at the periphery of forests continues to occur throughout the Kingdom’s rural areas, especially in the north and northeast regions, according to officials who documented the activities on site. Wong Devorn, a civil servant and history professor, told The ...
Voun Dara
Time is up for illegal loggers in protected park
The Royal Academy of Cambodia (RAC) will start enforcing the law to arrest perpetrators and seize timber and bulldozers as there is still illegal logging at Preah Vihear province’s Techo Sen Russey Trep Park. RAC president Sok Touch said yesterday that his patience has been exhausted, ...
Buth Sela
The guardians of Siamese rosewood
“We bury a GPS tracker in the wood. We call them rabbits,” says Cheewapap Cheewatham, director of Thailand’s Forest Protection and Fire Control Bureau, part of the forestry department. He tells China Dialogue that they used to just impound as evidence cut rosewood they found ...
Ryn Jirenuwat, Tyler Roney
Angkor sells out: Cambodia turns a blind eye to vanishing forests
A series of reports this year show that protected forest areas across Cambodia are under increasing threat from land grabs and deforestation. As Cambodians struggle with the economic impacts of COVID-19, journalists and advocates report that illegal logging and land development continues, from central Cambodia’s Prey Lang Forest to the Cardamom Mountains ...
Editorial
Alleged gov’t-linked land grabs threaten Cambodia’s Cardamom Mountains
Rising across remote stretches of southeast Cambodia, the Cardamom Mountains harbor dense tropical rainforest, much of it native growth carpeting the range’s wet slopes. Due to its remoteness, the vast protected area has historically seen relatively little human activity, which helped safeguard crucial tracts of ...
CHRIS HUMPHREY
Thai teak seized in SorPorKor raid north of Patong
The Forestry officials, along with police from the Natural Resources and Environmental Crime Suppression Division seized sawn pieces of timber valued at about B60,000 at the site, located in the hills on Phra Barami Soi 7. Boonlarp Suksai, Chief of the Royal Forestry Department Region 12 ...
The Phuket News