Government will start chipping away at protected areas
Between 2009 and 2012, the Ministry of Environment went on nationwide leasing spree, signing over vast swaths of the country’s nominally protected areas to private companies for rubber plantations and other agribusiness ventures. A new map of Cambodia’s protected areas shows the 36,000-hectare concession controlled by the Union Development Group neatly carved out of Botum Sakor National Park in Kong Kong province. The Environment Ministry, however, should be careful not to excise concessions with healthy ecosystems, Mr. Hardtke said, or those that cover parts of protected areas that help connect one ecosystem to another—even if damaged.
