Forest products

Watchara Kumpai, 68, spends most of his time in boots, stomping through coastal mangrove forests in southern Thailand. He used to work in the tin mining and logging industries that contributed to mangrove loss, until all concessions in mangrove areas were cancelled in 1991. Today, Watchara is dedicated ...

PHNOM PENH — In a rare move to combat forest crimes, Cambodian Environment Minister Eang Sophalleth on Sept. 2 banned all forest clearance at the site of a dam project in the country’s southwest. The ban came after multiple incidents of illegal logging inside a protected area ...

Despite sanctions put in place against the brutal military junta in Myanmar, US traders continue to source precious teak from the country for luxury yachts and flooring. The allegations are made in the new EIA report Acts of Defiance – How US traders are ignoring sanctions to import ...

Hunting in Cambodia’s protected areas and forests would be legal in some cases under a proposal from the country’s Ministry of Environment that conservation groups fear could lead to abuses that threaten wildlife populations, according to drafts of rule changes seen by RFA.  The ministry is ...

The confusion over Myanmar timber exports to India was laid to rest last month when the central government in New Delhi informed the Indian border state of Mizoram that timber was not on the restricted list of commodities from Myanmar. New Delhi’s directive was in response to a ...

When Sia Beng Hok goes to check his rubber and batai (Moluccan albizia) trees, he makes sure he has a rifle on the backseat of his four-wheel drive. His plantations – all 5,000 hectares (19sq miles) of them – sit on forest reserve land in Kelantan ...

Myanmar’s military junta exported more than $37 million worth of timber to nations with active sanctions on the country’s state-run timber monopoly, according to the environmental advocacy group Forest Trends. In a report released yesterday, the U.S.-based organization examined the impact of sanctions imposed since the ...

In January 2020, filmmaker Sean Gallagher traveled to Cambodia with a camera, drone, and a mission: to create a film revealing the impacts of deforestation. Riding on the backs of motorbikes driven by local activists, Gallagher spent several weeks venturing deep into protected forests in ...

After forests are logged, felled trees are typically sent to sawmills, where they’re processed into boards, or lumber. It’s in this processed form that wood typically enters the international commodity supply chain. But not all lumber is created equal. In the Greater Mekong region, high-quality hardwoods ...

Prime Minister Phankham Viphavanh joined students at the Faculty of Architecture, Lao National University, to plant 90 rosewood trees to mark National Arbour Day on June 1. This is a part of the government’s plans to plant 35 million trees over 36,950 hectares this year and ...