Forests and forestry
Forest protection
Kampot mangroves ‘cleared in land grab’
The Changhaon village community claims that many hectares of mangrove forest in the coastal area in a village in Teuk Chhou district’s Prek Tnort commune, in Kampot province, were being cut down to grab land for private ownership. However, they claim that the authorities have not ...
Voun Dara
'Safari tours' to cut conflict with wildlife
The Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation has unveiled plans to develop “safari tourism” on the edge of the world-heritage Huai Kha Kheng Wildlife Sanctuary to reduce growing conflict there between humans and wildlife. Department spokesman Sompoch Maneerat said locally run safari tourism is ...
Apinya Wipatayotin
In the rice-rich Mekong region, will husk briquettes take hold?
Sanu Kaji Shrestha was wandering along a Cypriot coastline 10 years ago, enjoying some downtime from a workshop he was leading on green energy technology, when he decided to collect some seaweed to experiment with. Shrestha was searching for ways to expand the types of raw materials ...
Lauren Crothers
In Cambodia, a rare acquittal in a climate of danger for green activists
In a rare ruling, a court in Cambodia has decided to acquit a Spanish environmental activist charged with incitement, the state’s default accusation against most forms of protest. Alejandro-Gonzalez Davidson, the founder of the NGO Mother Nature Cambodia (MNC), stood accused of acting as an accomplice ...
Andrew Nachemson
The right to community forest in Tanintharyi Region
When Charcoal burners began casting covetous eyes over the mangrove forest next to coastal Kanyin Chaung village in Tanintharyi Region, its residents joined forces to protect a natural resource that had served their community for generations. The threat emerged in about 2005 and it worried the ...
Kyaw Lin Htoon
Asian elephant footprints serve as safe spaces for frog nurseries
While wandering through northwestern Myanmar in 2016, a group of scientists stumbled on hundreds of huge tracks in the ground. According to a new paper in the journal Mammalia, these footprints, made by Asian elephants (Elephas maximus), have a lasting impact. Even when the giants that made ...
Nanticha Ocharoenchai
EU stumps up $11mln for Greater Mekong wildlife conservation
The European Union (EU) has teamed up with wildlife and conservation groups in the Greater Mekong region, Malaysia, and China to try and disrupt the flow of illegally trafficked wildlife through the region. The €10 million (about $11.14 million) project which will run through until December ...
Sreypov Men
The challenges of campaigning against wildlife trafficking in Vietnam
In late January, WildAid and the Ho Chi Minh City-based Center of Hands-on Actions and Networking for Growth and Environment (CHANGE) launched a graphic anti-wildlife trafficking campaign focused on three animals: pangolins, elephants and rhinos. In a bold move, the organizers brought a group of bloodied, weakened statues ...
Michael Tatarski
Forest activists call for seizure of assets from corrupt officials
Civil society and forest protection activists on Monday called for officials in the government and armed forces guilty of corruption and exploiting state property to be removed from their positions and have their assets frozen. The request came after a government spokesman said Prime Minister Hun ...
Soth Koemsoeun
Hunting the hunters
On a cliff overlooking the southwest plains of Cambodia, there is a bullet-ridden casino. Built in the 1920s, when Bokor was a hill resort largely reserved for wealthy French colonials, during the 1970s and 1980s it became the front line in the battle between the ...
