A surge in Chinese investment and in the numbers of migrant workers in Cambodia’s port city of Sihanoukville has left local beaches polluted and Cambodian residents struggling to meet higher prices as the cost of living rises, Cambodian sources say.
Category: Region
Selected environmental stories from media outlets in the Mekong region and beyond.
Myanmar Launches First Inquiry into Agricultural Chemicals and Their Effects
The first parliamentary inquiry into chemicals used in agriculture and their effects on the health and quality of life of farmers, workers and consumers across the country.
Tigers forever: a wildlife hike in north-east Laos
A guided trek on Mount Forever helps protect endangered tigers and reveals an exotic array of other, less elusive, wildlife
To Protect the Environment, Buddhist Monks Are Ordaining Trees
“They’re very wary of the monks getting together,” Chantal Elkin, a program manager for The Alliance of Religions and Conservation, told Sojourners. “Forest activism is [seen as] a threat to the government.”
Mekong Delta sinking as groundwater gets depleted
The Mekong Delta is subsiding faster than the rise in sea level, causing urban flooding, and humans are to blame.
Operation Mekong: China Solidifies Its Influence in Southeast Asia
China’s leadership now breaks with its decades-old doctrine of not getting involved in other countries’ political crises.
Mekong Institute partners with China and Thailand on managing Mekong dams
The project is geared toward collaborative information exchange among concerned agencies in Cambodia, P.R. China, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam, with emphasis on adaptive management and operation of hydropower projects as well as climate change mitigation.
Australian bank caught in violation of own policies and intl. human rights standards
In 2011, ANZ provided a $40 million loan to Phnom Penh Sugar, which had forcibly displaced hundreds of local farming families and employed school-aged children in dangerous conditions
Smartphones help to save forest in Cambodia
The app “Prey Lang App” makes it easy for local forest patrols in Cambodia to geo-reference, document, and upload data about forest resources and illegal logging.
Cambodia Faces Potential Economic Collapse
The slated withdrawal of crucial European Union trade preferences will likely force its leader to walk back a prolonged political crackdown, observers and labor groups say.