Chevron report completed

A tuk tuk driver parks outside a Caltex petrol station in Phnom Penh yesterday. Photograph: Pha Lina

Tuesday, 26 June 2012
Don Weinland
The Phnom Penh Post

Chevron has completed an environmental assessment for oil production in Cambodia’s Block A offshore oil field, a step insiders called important for the proposed extraction that appeared to stall early this year.

The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), completed in March and obtained yesterday by the Post, was the first to be seen publicly after Chevron’s 10 years in the Kingdom.

Documenting a rough three-phase plan, the EIA shows Chevron building up to 10 platforms during a nine-year period.

Risks associated with Chevron’s potential production were listed as “low” or “insignificant”.

When Blessing Becomes a Curse in the Niger Delta [-Will this be the Tonle Sap's fate?]

Severely Scarred Source of Survival. With their children in tow, the women survey the destruction wrought by the massive oil spill that was followed by an uncontrollable fire. They used to fish in this part of the Oya Lake. Photo from Environmental Rights Action (ERA)
Gathering Force. Women who are situated at the Niger are becoming increasingly visible as popular and legal actions against oil companies mount. Photo from ERA.

By Betty Abah
Women in Action, No. 2, 2009

Click here to read the entire original article in PDF format

The other day I saw a supervisor of Wilbros, an oil servicing firm operating in the area. I asked him why they were not giving any jobs to the women. They had just given some casual jobs to a few boys. He looked at us and replied that indeed there were jobs for the women. I asked him, “What jobs?” He put his hands on his crotch and said “This is the job for the women.” —Madam Adeline Gilbert, Woman Leader

If injustice had not existed and natural blessings had been left unabused, Cilia Neberi would be one of the happiest and most comfortable women to grace the earth’s surface. But then, it is a world where the reverse is the case. With decades of oil-related anguish behind her, the middle-aged mother of four is now dead and gone.

Cilia lived in Ikarama, an oil-producing community in the Niger Delta where Shell and Agip carry out large-scale drilling activities. Like many women farmers in Ikarama, Cilia was the bread winner of her family. Like many other people too, she and her family were severely threatened by the oil spills. For several months, her house was like an island, surrounded by dark, slimy and nauseating substances from one of the ruptured pipes of Agip, an oil facility that is stationed right at the centre of her community.

A slim woman with an oak-like will, Cilia joined a group of women in the community to protest such environmental degradation by Agip’s unregulated and insensitive drilling activities. When their cries and pleas fell on deaf ears, Cilia and her husband devised a means of safe-guarding themselves, especially their four young children. In the morning they headed to her in-laws’ house and returned in the evenings to simply sleep the menace away.

But the menace caught up with Cilia, who eventually complained of body aches and nausea that left her unable to work. The family had no money that could have given her quality medical help on time. The Agip-sponsored clinic was also useless. Contrary to its press releases, the clinic was only inhabited by reptiles. Cilia was later taken to the General Hospital at Yenagoa but she succumbed in just a couple of weeks.

Cilia is just one of the several cases experienced throughout the Niger Delta where a natural endowment of oil has become a grievous curse. The communities constantly grapple with the consequences of oil spills, gas flares and other menaces arising from unregulated explorative activities of the international oil companies.

Many women in these subsistence communities bear the burdensome task of caring for their families, protecting them from harsh pollution. The rate of cases of cancer, infertility, leukemia, bronchitis, asthma, still-births, deformed babies and other pollution-related ailments are unusually high in this region. From Ikarama to Akaraolu to Imiringi, women are bruised and dying.

As one farmer, Marthy Berebo shared, “If I am to undress before you, you will see the extent of the toll this pollution has taken on my body. The whole of my body is racked with aches.” Charity Seiba, 66-year old mother of 10 also said, “The same oil companies that sustain this country are killing us. This is the pain with which we have to live.”

Ikarama, a predominantly fishing and farming community of 10,000 people, also ranks as one of the most polluted communities in the Niger Delta. Settled along Taylor Creek, Ikarama is host to both the Nigeria Agip Oil Company (NAOC) and Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC). Shell’s pipes that link the Delta, Bayelsa and Rivers States all pass through Ikarama. Shell’s Okordia Manifold is also situated in Ikarama.

It is assumed that by hosting big international companies like Shell, communities flourish. But the contrary happens to Ikarama, as it finds itself in a deep and dark pool of poverty. The roads have yet to be paved, as promised by the company while the lives of people are becoming worse, with their livelihoods destroyed by the frequent oil spills.

Alili Ziah is a widow with seven children. Before, she could still provide for them through fishing but now that the water has been contaminated, her family has been forced to depend on other people’s charity. “Whenever I set traps and I go to inspect, they are soaked in crude oil,” she remarked.

Like Ikarama, Imiringi has been hosting several of Shell’s gas flaring sites since 1972. The health implications arising from the open, poisonous flames are enormous. People who live nearby complain of rashes on the skin, redness of the eyes and other complications. Contamination is quite likely since women usually dry their local staple, kpopko garri near these gas flaring sites. Women’s reproductive health has also been affected, as seen with the rising number of cases of infertility and birth deformities.

As noted by farmer Margaret Amos, “Since 1972, our crop yields have started depreciating. Then, as a young girl, I noticed that our crops such as cocoyam, cassava and plantain grew more luxuriantly and when we harvested them, we got bountiful yields. But all that is now history.”

Oil has been Nigeria’s lifeblood since the late 1950s, when Shell had its first successful oil well in Oloibiri in the Bayelsa State in 1956. Eighty per cent of the country’s wealth is derived from oil while 90 per cent of revenues come from oil-related businesses. About 50 per cent of Nigeria’s gross domestic product (GDP), 80 per cent of budgetary revenues and 95 per cent of foreign exchange earnings come from oil that is drilled at the Niger Delta.

Ten per cent of its crude oil is directed to the United States (US). According to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Nigeria is the eighth biggest exporter of petroleum in the world.

Shell is the most dominant and oldest players in the industry that also includes big names like Agip, Mobil, Chevron and ELF. In fact, it accounts for half of the total oil production in Nigeria. In both Bayelsa and Rivers states alone, Shell’s seismic lines cover 56,000 kilometres. The company has 7,000 kilometres of flow lines and 400 kilometres of pipelines. It has 349 drilling sites. At the height of its operations, Shell produced one million barrels of crude oil daily. This figure has been reduced with the attacks of militant groups in the last few years. But given the relative stability in this volatile region, there are prospects that the figure would once more increase.

Yet oil companies have very little to show in terms of its contributions to the communities’ development. In fact, they have merely subjected communities to more poverty and disease because of their unregulated means of polluting the land, water and air. In the Niger Delta alone, there are more than a hundred gas flare sites. It has been estimated that 13 per cent of the annual global gas flared or about 23 billion cubic meters out of 168 billion cubic meters come from Nigeria. It is said that with this unabated flaring, about US$15 million worth of gas is turned into smoke daily.

As Darlene Odonogu Samuel, a 46 year old mother of six children in Ikarama pointed out, “Shell agents, Agip agents, NGOs and other people have been coming here and making promises, but so far it has all come to nothing. Still, we have no good roads.”

Moreover between 1976 and 2001, the Nigerian government documented 6,817 spills, practically one a day for 25 years. Yet analysts suspect that the amount could even be 10 times higher.

With the huge money involved in this industry, it not surprising to see conflicts that claim the lives of over 1,000 people annually. Of the oil companies operating at the Niger Delta, Shell has been deemed as the most notorious as it sanctioned human rights abuses committed by security forces at its employ. Shell arms and pays government security personnel and outfits who are always quick to quell any signs of uprising and carry out wanton human rights abuses.

In all of these, women are the major victims, as widows and mothers. They have been the families’ pillars on whose shoulders many of sorrow and deprivation fall.

As Environmental Rights Action (ERAction) stated, “The oil and gas fields have not only witnessed massive crude oil spills and gas flares and explosions. We do know that due to high levels of human rights abuses, the oil fields are also knee-deep in blood.”

Conflicts emanating from the discontent and corruption around the oil industry indeed have a history. In the 1960s, the government fought hard to quell an uprising championed by a young Niger Deltan, Isaac Boro. Though this was suppressed and Boro was later conscripted into the Nigerian Army, only to be killed under questionable circumstances, there were many others who fell victims but whose struggles and fates were not well-documented.

The 1990s was one of the most tumultuous times in the Niger Delta. Writer and environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa roused the consciousness of the nation and the international community over the environmental injustice in Ogoniland. Following the controversial killing of four chiefs who were sympathetic to oil multinationals by irate mob of village youths, Saro-Wiwa was arrested and hanged. Military operatives paid by Shell moved into the communities with amoured tanks, guns and various weapons, shooting and killing hundreds of people including women and children, mowing down entire villages, and maiming thousands.

Today, many women still carry these scars and live in deformed bodies. One of the survivors is Promise Yibari Maapie, who had her left arm permantly withered as a result of a gun shot. Her daughter Joy also sustained damaging gun shots on her legs. “The soldiers brought pain, sorrow and hunger into my life,” she told a reporter.

After the infamous Ogoni genocide, there have been several cases, including that of the Odi Massacre in 1999, where entire towns were razed down. It was a retaliatory move by the the government’s troops, arising from the killing of some military men by militants.

In mid 2009, massacres and bombings happened in several villages in the Gbaramatu Kingdom in the Niger Delta. In the process, many women were killed, wounded or displaced. There were reported cases of those who gave birth in the forests and creeks while running away from the military attack. As usual, there were reports of rape by the soldiers.

Women are the foremost victims in the Niger Delta tragedy. Apart from contending with gas flares and oil spills, they also live at the very edge of their lives. When rusty pipelines conveying crude oil burst, farmlands, forests, streams and rivers are damaged. Scores are also killed as in October 1998 when an oil pipeline explosion roasted around 2,000 people in Jesse Town in Ethiope, West Local Government Council of the Delta State. Worse, government interventions are nonexistent and when they exist at all, they are either belated or half-baked.

Besides this, constructions of gigantic drilling projects pollute and alter the communities’ water ways, depriving residents’ access to water. These impacts are felt most by women. Aside from being farmers, they also provide food and water for the family. As Stella Ogbel, a resident in Imiringi shared, “When we were young, we used to be happy whenever it was raining. Rain water was considered to be clean, fit for drinking. We don’t have that these days. When we collect the rain water from our roofs now, the whole surface would be covered with soot occasioned by the gas flare in our community.”

Despite the tragedy that their bodies bear, women have been rendered voiceless in many communities. In most communities, it takes the special intervention of civil society organisations (CSOs) for women to be allowed into the town hall consultative fora where issues affecting the communities are discussed. Men would always insist that the matters to be discussed are too serious for women.

In many cases, women cannot claim land ownership. Farmlands usually belong to husbands and fathers. The deaths of their husbands or divorce could spell the end of their stay in those lands. Thus, environmental disasters constitute a double tragedy for women.

Nonetheless, in some communities, women are organising themselves, attempting to take up their destinities into their own hands and undoing the malevolent strings of the retrogressive customs in some communities. Such bold attempts can be attributed to the intervention of CSOs and to a large extent, changing times.

For 16 years, the Environmental Rights Action (ERA)/Friends of the Earth Nigeria, the country’s foremost environmental justice civil society group, has engaged oil-producing communities in the Niger Delta region. It has held awareness-creating and advocacy skillbuilding workshops via town hall meetings and other fora. ERA has also monitored oil spills and other environmental disasters.

ERA also produces publications, newsletters, journals, books and other publications documenting instances of environmental degradation. On certain instances, these have drawn postive responses.

In collaboration with affected communities, ERA has lodged legal actions against Shell and other multinationals for many cases of environmental injustices. ERA has also taken
up the cases of affected communities to the court of international public opinion. It held a picket outside Shell’s headquarters in the Netherlands and presented cases against Chevron to the US Congress.

Aside from its engagement with women in Ikarama, Imiringi and Akaraolu, ERA is working with women in Iguobazuwa in Edo State whose rich rain forest has been forcibly annexed by the French tire-making multinational, Michelin, without prior consent, thereby destabilising many women farmers in the community.

Betty Abah is the Gender Focal Person of Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria, the country’s foremost environmental justice non-government organisation.

Sources:
Alagao, Morris. (2008). “Testimonies from Imirngi for ERA.” (copy text).
Bassey, Nnimmo. (2008). “The Future of Crude Oil is Already History,” presentation at Oilwatch General Assembly in September 2008 in South Africa.
ERAction. (2004). “Shell: A Corporate Terrorist at Work.” (No. 5, 2004).
DonPedro, Ibiba (2005). Out of a Bleak Landscape. Lagos, Foreword Communications Ltd.
Gbenro Olajuyigbe (2008). ABLAZE for Oil!: Studies on the Niger Delta Conflict. Nigeria: Action Aid.
Iyayi, Festus. (13 December 2006) “Political Economy of Oil and Gas Exploitation in Nigeria” In The Tribune.
Okonta, Ike. (2007) When Citizens Revolt: Nigerian Elites, Big Oil and the Ogoni Struggle for Self-determination. Trenton, New Jersey: Africa World Press, Inc.

Development of the Indochinese Triangle under criticisms

Native people living in Cambodia east along the Indochinese Triangle zone

Friday 12 March 2010
Free Press Magazine Online
Translated from Khmer by Socheata
Click here to read the article in Khmer
Please help support the Free Press Magazine Online by providing your donation

It has been almost 11 years since the Triangle Development zone (also known as the Indochinese Triangle) was initiated by the Khmer PM. This zone includes various regions where Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam meet, and the goal was to turn it into a special economic zone. As this zone is undergoing development as planned, it also attracts criticisms from human rights organizations, as well as from environmental protection groups.

For Cambodia, the Indochinese Triangle encompasses the province of Kratie, Stung Treng, Mondulkiri and Ratanakiri – provinces which are known to have fertile lands, filled with forest resources and are mainly populated by numerous ethnic minorities.

The Triangle development plan which was initiated since 1999 pushes investors, rich and powerful people alike to grab lands – including rice fields, plantations and sacred lands – from Cambodian ethnic minorities, even though such action is not condone by the Cambodian land law. Under this condition, Cambodian ethnic minorities became victims after losing their personal belongings, their community and traditional lands which they owned for several generations long. In all these cases, the government does not seem to provide any resolution to help protect the safety of the ethnic minorities as stipulated by the land law which was introduced by the government.

Nevertheless, on Thursday, officials from human rights groups indicated that the speed of the development is affecting both the communities involved and the environment. Crimé Bonne, a facilitator for the International Forest Community NGO, indicated that the development was conducted at a too fast pace and no thought was given to the rights of the ethnic minority people. He added: “These four provinces have the largest number of native people. Therefore, the developers should take into account this issue in their plan. We hope that the development plan will respect the human rights of the native people.”

In February a group of Cambodian ethnic minority people representing 20 groups participated in a meeting organized by the UN regarding the issues faced by native people. During that meeting, the group demanded that the Cambodian government immediately put an end to the violation of their rights.

Coal Plant Stirs Passions in Cambodia

Chhith Sam Ath, the executive director of the NGO Forum on Cambodia, says a proposed coal plant has not been properly vetted for environmental impacts. (NGO Forum)

November 25, 2009
By SIMON MARKS
The New York Times

Last week, executives from Leader Universal Holdings, a Malaysian company angling to build Cambodia’s largest coal-fired power plant, met with Cambodian government officials and environmentalists to discuss the company’s impact analysis for the proposed 100-megawatt facility.

There was little in the way of agreement.

The Cambodian government’s power development plan for the next decade includes the construction of nine hydroelectric dams and nine coal plants. Once operational, they will provide Cambodia with more than 3,000 megawatts of energy.

The government favors such large-scale projects, arguing it is the only affordable means for large-scale electricity generation.

Environmentalists, meanwhile, favor a decentralized energy system, where solar power, micro-hydropower stations and biomass gasifiers, for example, could help satisfy demand.

They also argued that a plant like the one planned by Leader Universal could wreak havoc on air quality and vastly increase the country’s greenhouse gas emissions.

“Particle pollution such as soot is one of the most deadly forms of air pollution,” said Chhith Sam Ath, the executive director of NGO Forum, an association for local and international non-governmental organizations working in Cambodia. “The soot can also cause acidification of waters, depleted soil nutrients and the destruction of forests and crops.”

Mr. Sam Ath also said the company’s environmental impact statement overlooked other areas, including wastewater disposal and specific numbers on how much carbon dioxide the plant would emit.

“As CO2 emissions are one of the leading contributors to climate change, the plant should study the amount of CO2 that will be emitted and be required to use the latest ‘clean coal’ technologies,” he said.

Company officials, however, said the plant would comply with all the safety and environmental specifications set out by international bodies like the World Bank. They also said emissions and wastewater would have minimal impact on local communities, given the $3.6 million the company had set aside for mitigation efforts during the first year.

The company also suggested that large-scale power plants were the only way to accommodate Cambodia’s growing energy demand.

“To be practical, a decentralized energy system will not provide enough energy,” said one Leader Holdings executive, who did not want to be named because he was not authorized to speak by company officials. “Coal is the most economic way to generate power at this point.”

Jeroen Verschelling, the director of Kamworks, a solar energy company in Phnom Penh, disagreed, saying that Cambodia’s rising demand could easily be offset by greater efficiency.

“The first thing you need to do is see if you really need the energy,” Mr. Verschelling said. “A lot if energy is simply wasted.”

Asia's rubber plantations threaten biodiversity

May 27, 2009
ABC Radio Australia

A scientific report just out, has warned that rubber plantations are expanding rapidly in Southeast Asia, especially in the Indo-China region, and that this may have devastating environmental consequences. The report in Science magazine says more than 500-thousand hectares may have been already converted in the uplands of China, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Burma.

Presenter:Sen Lam
Speaker: Jefferson M. Fox, senior fellow at the East West Centre in Hawaii

Click here to listen to the audio program (Windows Media)

FOX: Well, what we really caught is the mountainous portion of mainland South East Asia or 'Montane' mainland. It's not just traditional Indo-china which I interpreted meaning Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. And we include in this this definition of our region, the most southern portion of Yunnan, Xishuangbanna, which is where the Chinese went in and started rubber plantations in the 1950s, which was very unheard of at that time. Rubber was seen as being more tropical and it was planted in Peninsula Malaysia, southern Thailand, Indonesia. But the Chinese said we need some of our own rubber for national defence purposes and said Xishuangbanna and Hainan Island are our most tropical regions and they went in and established plantations and did some of their own research and developed more cold-tolerant varieties of rubber. So today in Xishuangbanna, basically everything that is not a protected landscape and lies within about 300 metres to 1200 metres wherever the freezing line happens to be is wall-to-wall rubber. So over there, it is clearly a juggernaut.

LAM; So how is this bad for the environment?

FOX: Well, we've done some work, our work in China was cut off early, but our works suggest that.. Rubber as you know, is introduced from Brazil, it's not native to the region. The trees in the region tend to respond to the monsoon. They may drop their leaves during the dry season and they don't flush again until the rainy season sets in. But there is not a monsoon in Brazil and it seems that the trees there respond to daylight length. So at the Spring equinox we begin to get flushing and that's what we see here. So it is at the peak of the dry season, we're seeing rubber begin to flush leaves and draw on deep groundwater reserves for the water it needs. And so, by extension we argue that if you convert your landscape to rubber, your dry season water shortage is probably going to be greater than it has been in the past. We've only got one or two years worth to research on that but are continuing to do more. But as you convert the plantations, you have more roads, you have erosion associated with roads, you have to terrace the rubber plantations. When I say plantations, I don't mean only large government or private enterprise plantations. There is many small-holders across the region too and when you unite their land from one to the next, it becomes plantation, in its formation.

LAM: But as I understand it, commodity prices, certainly rubber prices have fallen drastically compared to the hey day of say the 1960s for instance. But obviously these smallholders still find a valuable cash crop to cultivate?

FOX: I have not looked at rubber prices this week, but they did fall in the fall (autumn) when we had the economic crisis set in. But at least in the American papers today, we had an article on how well the car industry is doing in China. And that of course is going to overtake the US car industry. You have to have some natural rubber for car tyres and so rubber prices, as I understand, have rebounded and are doing well again today.

LAM: Is there evidence of forests being cleared for these plantations? Is there evidence of new plantations cropping up?

FOX: Where the forest set is being cleared is a secondary forest that is associated with the traditional agricultural system that was found in this region, which was shifting agriculture, swidden or slash and burn, for the derogative term. And that tree cover was there because of that type of land use system, they had abandoned the land and allowed it to lay fallow and so we had tree cover associated with that. And when we converted it to rubber, we lose the native vegetation, we replace it with an introduced tree cover in our monoculture.

LAM: Is it to simplistic to say swidden agriculture is probably more preferable in environmental terms, compared to rubber plantations?

FOX: It's probably to simplistic to say that. But we do try to make the point that swidden did have its good points and there is an awful lot of bio-diversity associated with swidden, including the different types of trees that were allowed to regenerate. Of course as well as the agro-biodiversity, we will lose a large portion of that as we go to mono-cultures. The erosion associated with swidden of course dependent on how intensely the swidden is and the length of the fallow period. But in most of the swidden systems we have monitored, even under fallows, three, four year fallows, the erosion is high the first year when its cleared, but then drops off to very quickly. So it's arguable that swidden probably has less erosion than some of these commercial crops that we seeing today.

UN report cites Chinese dams as threat to Mekong

Monday, May 25, 2009
GoKunming.com

China's plans to build a series of eight dams on the upper reaches of the Mekong River have come under criticism by the United Nations, which released a report last week stating that the Chinese plan "may pose the single greatest threat to the river".

The Mekong River – known in China as the Lancang River – is a source of food and livelihood for the 65 million people living in the river basin in Yunnan, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.

The river's water quality has deteriorated in recent years, but according to the UN report, it has not yet reached "alarming levels". However, China's dams would likely lead to "changes in river flow volume and timing, water quality deterioration and loss of biodiversity." The area's wealth of biodiversity recently received global attention with the discovery of 1,000 new species of animals and plants in the region.

Ma Zhouxu, spokesman for China's Foreign Ministry, told reporters last week that the Chinese government is equally focused on the Mekong's development and protection.

China is not the only country with big dam plans for the river – Laos is planning 23 dams on the Mekong and tributaries of the river to be finished before 2011. Vietnam and Cambodia also have plans to build new dams on the river.

The Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS), which includes Yunnan and Guangxi plus the five countries through which the Mekong flows, is experiencing rapid development and economic and industrial expansion.

This dynamism will increase pressure on the river, but according to Mukand S Babel, one of the authors of the UN report, "The Mekong is in good condition at this time and can take more pressure such as irrigation development or industrial development."

The report did note that river basins along the Mekong including Tonle Sap in Cambodia, Nam Khan in Laos and Sekong-Sesan Srepok in Vietnam and Cambodia are in danger from increasing water demand and development and called for coordinated planning by the region's governments to deal with existing and future problems before they get out of hand.

Tread Heavily: China's Tire Demand Rolls over Southeast Asian Forests

Ravaged by rubber In the Chinese province of Xishuangbanna, terraced rubber plantations have replaced swidden fields and secondary forests. (Photo: Alan Ziegler)

China's thirst for rubber is destroying the environment -- and livelihoods -- in Southeast Asia.

May 21, 2009
By Brendan Borrell
Scientific American

Geographer Jefferson Fox thought he was on to something big when the Chinese military stripped his team's weather monitoring equipment from a montane rubber plantation in the run-up to last year's Olympics. How big? In the past 20 years, more than 1.2 million acres (485,000 hectares) of evergreen broadleaf and secondary forests have been cleared throughout Southeast Asia to make way for rubber plantations to fuel China's growing appetite for automobile tires.

Fox—who is based at the East West Center in Honolulu—warns in Science this week that the environmental consequences of these massive land use changes, particularly on water resources, could be devastating.

Economists are also sounding the alarm, cautioning in a series of articles set to be published in Human Ecology that government policies that have forced these farmers to abandon traditional agriculture practices will leave them vulnerable to future fluctuations in rubber prices.

Swidden, or slash-and-burn, agriculture was once practiced throughout the world as a means to cultivate on otherwise infertile soils. But with the rise of modern agricultural techniques, Europeans began to view it as an abominable and primitive practice. As Capt. P. Cupet, a member of France's Pavie Mission to Indochina in the late 19th century once wrote, "These savages are the greatest destroyers of forests I know."

But Fox and his two coauthors believe these "savages" were better at preserving biodiversity than current land-use practices encouraging monoculture, or single-crop, agricultural development in Southeast Asia. Today, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand—with international encouragement—have adopted laws that criminalize swidden agriculture, or otherwise restrict land-use options to make the practice impossible. As a result, Fox says that Chinese investors have been able to move in and secure sometimes questionable deals that allow them to develop rubber plantations on lands once populated by leopards, monkeys and tigers.

Rob Cramb, an economist at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, agrees that the environmental fallout from the shift is striking, but he is most concerned about the livelihoods of small farmers who have been forced to change their traditional methods. He acknowledges that some may be successful in the short term, but notes that "Having so many livelihoods tied to a single commodity (that is rubber) is potentially very dangerous."

As it turns out, Fox says that he and his colleagues were the victims of a new Chinese government policy that prevents foreigners from collecting meteorological data. Fox's research, funded by the National Science Foundation and NASA, was designed to test his theory that rubber trees, which are exotics from the South America, differ from native vegetation in that they suck up most of their water when the soil is the driest at the beginning of the monsoon season.

This phenomenon could lead to water shortages in the future, and he recommends that farmers continue to cultivate rubber but combine it with other crops and forest types. Because their experiments were cut short, he has set up new weather towers in Thailand and Cambodia to monitor how much water rubber trees absorb compared with native species.

Despite the warnings, Fox says it is unlikely the governments in Southeast Asia will change tack.

"We can report that this is not a good trend for the environment and for people's livelihoods," he says, "but I don't think it's going to stop."

Rubber plantations could have 'devastating' impact in Asia

Friday, May 22, 2009

CHICAGO (AFP) — The expansion of rubber plantations in southeast Asia could have a "devastating" environmental impact, scientists warned Thursday as they pressed for a substantial increase in forest preserves.

More than 500,000 hectares (1.2 million acres) may have already been converted to rubber plantations in the uplands of China, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar.

And researchers predict the area of land dedicated to rubber and other farming systems could more than double or triple by 2050, replacing lands currently occupied by evergreen broadleaf trees and secondary vegetation growing in areas subjected to slash-and-burn farming.

That could result in a significant reduction in carbon biomass, dessicate the region's water systems, and increase the risk of landslides through erosion, researchers from China, Singapore and the US warned in an essay in the journal Science.

"The unrestricted expansion of rubber in montane mainland southeast Asia could have devastating environmental effects," wrote lead author Alan Ziegler of the National University of Singapore.

Ziegel and his colleagues warned "time is too short" to wait for results from studies aimed providing reliable assessments of the impact on water systems.

"A substantial increase in natural reserve areas could help to reduce the threats to biodiversity and carbon stocks," they wrote.

The authors also suggested promoting "diversified agroforestry systems in which cash crops such as rubber and oil palm play important roles, but are not planted as monocultures."

Government Praised for Ban on Sand Export

By VOA Khmer, Sothearith Im
Original report from Washington
15 May 2009

While the Cambodian government is often criticized for poor management of its natural resources, it earned praise this week for a ban on the export of sand.

Even Global Witness, an environmental watchdog that has been sharply critical of the government’s exploitation of timber and minerals, welcomed the ban.

Cambodia was exporting sand to Vietnam and Singapore, but the practice can have a devastating impact on coastal environments. Prime Minister Hun Sen issued a directive May 8 that would halt the export of sand, while allowing dredging for local demand.

More than 120 sand-dredging companies are estimated to be operating in Cambodia, removing thousands of tons of sand from coastal and river bottoms.

Global Witness spokeswoman Amy Barry said the ban was a good measure, but it was only the first step toward sustainable management of Cambodia’s natural resources, including forests, minerals and, potentially, oil.

“We want to make sure we call on the prime minister, Hun Sen, to ensure that his decree is implemented and to monitor the sand-dredging and export,” Barry said.

Cheam Yiep, a lawmaker for the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, said the ban followed complaints by citizens and a report from the Sand Resource Management Committee.

“That’s why recently [Hun Sen] issued a decree to stop sand-exporting operations,” he said.

The ban was imposed for three reasons, he said. First, sand export was not benefiting the government; second, it was damaging personal property; and third, it was harming rivers and marine areas that legally belong to the government.

Private companies violating the ban would be sued, he said.

“We already have a law,” he said. “When the prosecutor files a complaint, the investigative judge will make a decision accordingly.”

Chan Yutha, chief of cabinet for the Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology, said the ban was put into effect immediately following the order by Hun Sen. Now all sand-dredging will be re-examined, he said.

“I just want to clarify that sand-dredging operations have either positive or negative effects,” he said. “If they follow technical standards, it is a good impact, but if the technical standard is violated, it has a negative impact, such as the collapse of riverbanks.”

Dredgers in violation of the standards are warned or fined, their tools and equipment confiscated, he said.

Even with this ban in place, critics say law enforcement and policy implementation in Cambodia remain weak. The government has sold many of its assets in the past, including sand, beaches, and historical buildings, to private companies.

Global Witness has issued detailed reports on deforestation undertaken with impunity and the stripping of the country’s mineral resources. With potentially lucrative offshore oil deposits under exploration, the worry is that income from state resources will benefit only a handful of powerful elites.

"Damned" Chinese dam project in Cardamom mountains threatens rarest wildlife

'Unnecessary' dam project threatens rarest wildlife

Monday, 29 September 2008
By Michael McCarthy, Environment editor
The Independent (UK)

One of the world's rarest reptiles, the critically-endangered Siamese crocodile, is gravely threatened by a proposed dam in an unspoilt region of Cambodia, British conservationists warn.

Construction of the Chay Areng dam in the Cardamom mountains will wipe out a fifth or more of the remaining population of the crocodiles, which stands at fewer than 200 individuals in the wild, according to Fauna and Flora International (FFI), which is based in Cambridge.

It will displace hundreds of indigenous people from their homes, and do enormous damage to the wildlife in a valley which alone holds more than 30 globally threatened species of mammals, birds, reptiles, fish and amphibians, ranging from tigers, Asian elephants and pileated gibbons to the white-winged duck, the yellow-headed temple turtle and one of the world's rarest and most prized freshwater fish, the Asian arowana.

Furthermore, says FFI, an economic assessment showed that the 120ft dam, which is being promoted by a Chinese power company, is not necessary for Cambodia's future electricity demand and is in effect surplus to requirements. FFI is calling on the Cambodian government to cancel the scheme.

Were it to go ahead, the Siamese crocodiles would be the most notable casualties of the project in wildlife terms. The stocky, 10ft-long reptile, which feeds largely on fish and snakes, is extinct over 99 per cent of its original range, with tiny remaining groups in Laos, Thailand and Vietnam apart from Cambodia, where the Areng river habitat is the most secure and significant breeding site in the world, harbouring between 40 and 50 individuals.

If the Areng river is dammed, says FFI, this fragile population will be seriously reduced or wiped out. The inundation will destroy vital lakeside nesting areas, shallow feeding zones, sandy basking areas along the river, and essential lakeside burrows used for shelter. The organisation also fears that the 1,000-plus Chinese workers who will be brought in to build the dam will begin poaching the other wildlife in the valley, saying that this has happened in similar schemes elsewhere.

The whole range of the Cardamom mountains in western Cambodia has hitherto been one of the best unspoilt areas of montane rainforest in South-east Asia, having been protected from exploitation for decades by the region's wars. FFI says it is "the untouched jewel in the crown of Asian biodiversity".

But now it is being opened up, especially by the Chinese, who are offering to build hydropower and other generating infrastructure for the Cambodians in exchange for a future share in the country's untapped natural resources, which include oil and gas. Many of the rivers of the Cardamom range have dams proposed for them, and one, at O'Som, is already going ahead.

FFI says its recognises that Cambodia needs more electricity and some of it will come from hydropower. But it says that a 2007 report, the Master Plan Study of Hydropower Development in Cambodia, commissioned by the Japan International Co-operation Agency and the Cambodian Ministry of Mines and Energy, identified 10 priority sites that would be sufficient to meet the projected national demand – and significantly, these did not include the Chay Areng.

"The Areng dam is unnecessary and surplus to requirements," said Jenny Daltry, a senior conservation biologist with FFI. "Hundreds of households of an indigenous people, the Khmer Daeum, will be displaced and have to move. These are people who have been there for hundreds of years and who really do live in harmony with nature and have set up their own protected areas in the forest, and six villages of them will go, and possibly seven.

"In wildlife terms, it will be a disaster. The crocodiles, which represent at least a fifth of the world's population in the wild, will disappear and there will be catastrophic damage to other wildlife.

"It is still up to the Cambodian government to approve or reject the proposal from the Chinese company and we strongly feel it should be rejected."

Cambodia needs 1.14 bln USD to develop 7 hydropower projects

PHNOM PENH, Sep 16, 2008 (Xinhua) - Cambodia needs 1.14 billion U. S. dollars to develop seven priority hydropower projects out of the 29-hydropower-project master plan, according to a report released on Tuesday.

The location of the hydropower sites will be in the northeastern and southwestern of Cambodia, according to the report from a joint study by Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Cambodian Ministry of Industry, Mine and Energy (MIME).

"We have to discuss them in details to implement the priority hydropower projects," said Ith Prang, Secretary of State for MIME.

"When we have electricity from hydropower, it will provide electricity supply of cheap price and help reduce poverty in the country," he added.

The report said that Cambodia has two existing hydropower stations, including Kirirom I and O Chum with the capacity of 12 and one megawatts respectively, which are already operated by Electricity Authority of Cambodia.

The hydropower master plan is a part of generation expansion in Cambodia, the report said, adding that the target is 100 percent of village electrification, including battery lighting by 2020 and 70 percent level of household electrification with grid quality by 2030.

SEZ port project stirs anger

Villagers from Roluos village in Kampot survey their fishing grounds. The mixed-use project by businessman Wing Huor has been filling in costal areas with sand. (Photo: HENG CHIVOAN)

Thursday, 11 September 2008
Written by Khouth Sophakchakrya The Phnom Penh Post

Fishermen in Kampot province complain that a new SEZ project will destroy their livelihoods and forever damage their mangroves and their coastline

Kampot Province - MORE than 300 villagers have filed complaints with the Kampot provincial governor to stop a private company from developing a coastal fishing area.

Under a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) agreement with the government, businessman Wing Huor's Kampot SEZ has been filling in coastal mangrove forests with sand, according to local residents.

The project is to eventually include a new port, factory, market, condominium complex and public park located on about 1,000 hectares of coast.

Koem Da, a resident of Roluos village in Boeung Touk commune, said people in the community rely on the area being developed for fishing.

"The pumping has filled in many fishing areas and is taking away our ability to survive here," Koem Da said.

Patrolling the coast
She said local villagers have begun patrolling fishing areas to prevent the company from continuing to pump.
"We are following the law by protecting our environment, but the company claims that what we do is illegal."
Wing Huor was travelling on Wednesday and could not be reached for comment.

"We know the company has a development project with the government that is worth millions of dollars, but they never consulted us before they began about how it would affect our community," Lor Chhean, a fisherman from Prek Thanaut commune, said.
If the company keeps pumping sand...everything we rely on will be lost.
Pak Tyram, deputy chief of Treuy Koh commune in Kampot district, said more than 90 percent of people in the commune are fishermen.

"The mangrove forests are where we catch fish, prawns and crab. If the company keeps pumping sand to fill in these areas, everything we rely on will be lost," he said.

More projects expected
Tryy Chhoun, a Kampot coordinator for the rights group Adhoc, said many new development projects have been slated for coastal areas throughout the province, and the government has targeted prime fishing spots for the establishment of SEZs.
"This is Cambodia, not Hong Kong or Singapore. The government should rethink these projects," he said.

Khem Bunheng, director of Kampot's Department of Environment, admitted that the government has targeted beachfront land to attract foreign investment and that such projects would have an impact on local communities.

"Development always affects some people's living conditions, but we can't survive without development," he said.

Sar Sorin, director of the District Fisheries Administration of Kampot, said the government has carefully studied all proposals for coastal development and that whatever problems exist for local villagers will be temporary.

"I believe the villagers and the company will be able to find a way to work together for their mutual benefit," he said.

New $4b dams in planning

Friday, 05 September 2008
Written by Thet Sambath
The Phnom Penh Post

Proposed 10 dams will boost irrigation, generate electricity

THE Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology has begun preliminary studies for the building of a series of dams across four provinces.

"We are planning to build more than 10 dams and related irrigation systems in four northwestern provinces to ensure rice production during both the rainy and dry seasons," Veng Sakhon, secretary of state for the ministry, told the Post this week.

The proposed dams would provide the country with a more modern irrigation system as well as generate electricity for rural communities, he said.

However, other dam projects have come under fire for their impact on the environment and lack of transparency.

The ministry aims to build four dams in Pursat province that would supply irrigation to more than 35,000 hectares of land and generate as much as 300 megawatts of power for local communities. Other proposed dam sites include locations in Battambang, Kampong Chhnang and Banteay Meanchey provinces, and the ministry is consulting with engineers from China and South Korea, Veng Sakhon said.

He added that the government must look outside the country for the money needed to complete the ambitious project.

"We will need more than US$4 billion," he said, adding that the ministry is still in the preliminary stages of planning the massive projects.

Chan Tong Yves, secretary of state for the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, said Cambodia must improve its irrigation systems to meet greater agricultural and export demands. "We have suffered drought in some areas, but nothing serious yet," he said.

Meas Sotheavy, head of the statistics office at the ministry's Planning and Statistics Department, said only a relatively small portion of Cambodia's rice fields is irrigated.

"Now, only about 30 percent of rice paddies are connected to irrigation systems. We'd like to get that number to 40 percent by the end of this year," she said.

Hydropower projects lack transparency and could displace thousands in Cambodia, says UN

Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Published Aug. 28, 2008

Over the past year Phnom Penh has been considering several multi-million dollar dam projects around the lush Cardamom mountains and in other regions which threaten the country's wildlife and, if implemented, could lead to the displacement of thousands of people.

“The prime minister has been pushing to build these dams very quickly,” said Seng Bunra, Cambodia’s country director for Conservation International, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) working to protect rainforests worldwide. “'We need to make sure the feasibility studies are not rushed, and that care is taken in their construction.”

Bunra is especially concerned about a hydropower project on the Areng river, which he says could flood 20,000 hectares and displace some 1,500 primarily indigenous people.

The government has appeared to be unwilling to discuss the feasibility and environmental effects of the dam, he said.

“They [the government] had a research team studying the feasibility of the Areng project,” Bunra told IRIN, “but they just… kept it private, and then stopped studying it.”

Lack of public consultation

The World Commission on Dams (WCD) [see:], which sets international hydropower standards, says construction locations should be determined through a public consultation process.

A joint report by the NGOs International Rivers (IR) and the Rivers Coalition in Cambodia (RCC) also concluded that “hydropower development in Cambodia has proceeded in the absence of meaningful public consultation and an overall lack of transparency in the decision-making process.”

The report points out that Prime Minister Hun Sen and his cabinet have repeatedly made decisions regarding hydropower “behind closed doors”.

“We're still not certain on the actual roles of the Ministry of Environment, Ministry of Industry, Mines, and Energy, and the National Electricity Authority,” said Ngy San, director of the RCC. “We're concerned the government has not been releasing this information publicly, but the prime minister seems to be the main decision-maker regardless.”

Representatives from the Ministry of Industry, Mines, and Energy were unavailable for comment.

China's influence

To counteract spiralling electricity prices (some of the highest in the world, according to the World Bank), the government has embraced a development plan tapping into Cambodia's vast river resources, with annual funding from Beijing (US$600 million) that almost equals the total of Western donor monetary aid.

In April, Chinese Foreign Minister Wen Jiabao promised $1 billion in aid to Cambodia specifically for two hydropower projects, which have since materialised into the Stung Tatay and Stung Russey Chrum Krom dams.

Unlike aid from Western governments and NGOs, Chinese aid comes with no good governance or transparency strings attached. Premier Hun Sen praised China after an earlier $600 million aid package in 2006 for not “interfering with the internal affairs of Cambodia”.

However, whether Chinese companies will build dams that meet international environmental and social standards remains questionable, says the IR report

China's largest hydropower firm, Sinohydro Corporation, will build the $280 million Kamchay dam inside a major national park, potentially flooding 2,000 hectares of protected forest, the report warns.

Sinohydro, owned by the Chinese government, was “downgraded” in 2006 after a government review - for its poor performance and for unspecified safety and environmental accidents - the IR report notes.

The details of many hydropower contracts - particularly Sinohydro's - remain unknown. Cambodian lawmakers were asked to endorse the Sinohydro deal in 2006 without even having had access to the contract, according to the Cambodia Daily newspaper.

Environmental concerns

Another dam project under way on the Atay river threatens endangered Siamese crocodiles, which rely on the river's seasonal levels for breeding.

Various species of turtle, fish, and birds are also at risk, according to Flora and Fauna International, an NGO that protects two wildlife sanctuaries in the Cardamom Mountains.

Local diets depend particularly on fish, of which several species may face significantly reduced populations, according to Flora and Fauna.

The Atay dam will flood 3,560 hectares of protected forest in the Phnom Samkok Wildlife Sanctuary, and 5,193 hectares in total, according to a recent assessment by the Chinese Danang Corporation.

“In terms of conservation, it's a lot of land,” Bunra told IRIN. “We cannot stop the development projects in these areas, but we can only ask the government and companies to reduce the environmental impact.”

Government’s stance

The official stance of the Ministry of Industry, Mines, and Energy states that the Cardamom Mountains consist of over one million hectares, making 5,000 hectares worth sacrificing to lower energy costs in Cambodia.

Thorn Kimhong, who directs the Cardamom natural protected areas for the Ministry of Environment, said the Atay dam was necessary. “The dams must be built,” he told IRIN. “We need it for lower energy prices and for developing Cambodia.”

But for the thousands of residents who could be displaced, uncertainty lies ahead.

Dammed if you do...

Friday, 04 July 2008
Written by Sovan Nguon The Phnom Penh Post

A hydropower dam being built in southwestern Cambodia will destroy more than 5,000 hectares of protected forests, say researchers who conducted an environmental assessment for the joint-venture’s Chinese partner.

The revelation was made by Um Serey Vuth, the leader of a team of researchers employed by the China Datang Corporation.

The corporation and its partners, CHD Cambodia Hydropower Development and Cambodia Power Grid, unveiled plans in May to invest $313.36 million to build the 120MW Atay dam, which is due for completion in 2012.

Serey Vuth, who headed a team of 10 researchers, said the assessment showed the dam would destroy 5,193 hectares of protected forests in the Phnom Samkok Wildlife Sanctuary and the Cardamom Mountains.

He said the assessment began in May, when work started on the project, and was completed late last month.

The assessment showed the dam would flood 3,650 hectares of protected forest in the wildlife sanctuary and 1,543 hectares of protected forest in the mountain ranges, he said.

He said trees had to be removed from the affected areas otherwise they would affect the quality of water in the dam.

Serey Vuth said, however, that the dam would have a minimal impact on people living in the project area and would bring much needed electricity to the Kingdom.

“Only 36 families in three villages in O’Som commune, Veal Veng district, Pursat province will be affected, along with about 1,000 fruit trees and 10 hectares of farmland,” said Serey Vuth.

He said the local authority and residents supported the project.

“The authority and the people support the project 100 percent because they will have access to the electricity generated by the dam," Serey Vuth said.

Seng Bunra, the country director of US-based NGO Conservation International, expressed qualified reservations about the project.

"For environmentalists, 5,000 hectares of protected forest is a lot if we are talking about preserving biodiversity, wildlife and habitats, and absorbing carbon dioxide," Bunra told the Post on July 3.

"But sometimes we need to make sacrifices because our country needs electricity and we just express our concerns.

"We can't prevent the government from developing the country but what we insist on with this project is protection for forests around the dam site to avoid further destruction," he said, warning that if this was not done up 10,000 hectares would be at risk of being cleared of trees.

He said that the Cardamom Mountains, which cover about two million hectares, is a unique eco-system in Cambodia containing rare wildlife such as tigers, elephants, wild buffalo, bears, Siamese crocodiles and dragon fish.

"In the Southeast Asian region, there is no protected forest as picturesque as those in the Cardamom Mountains," Bunra said.

Defending the project, Ith Praing, secretary of state for the Ministry of Industry, Mine and Energy, told the Post on July 3 that environmental damage was acceptable in hydropower projects because an adequate electricity supply was crucial for attracting foreign investment.

“Before allowing the development, we had to weigh its environmental impact and its contribution to development," he said.

"We see that development provides more advantages, so we decided to approve the project," Praing said, adding that improvements in electricity supply would also help to raise living standards.

“The more electricity is generated, the cheaper it will be, so there will be more foreign investors interested in doing business in Cambodia," he said.

Praing said the Atay hydropower project was one of three in protected forest areas in the Cardamom Mountains involving Chinese companies.

He said the two others were approved in mid-June. They are the China National Heavy Machinery Corporation's $540 million project to build the 246MW Tatay River dam, due for completion in 2013, and the 338MW Russey Chrum Krom project, involving an investment of $495.7 million by the Michelle Corporation, due to be finished in 2015.

Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Yim Sovann said that while the country needed to generate more electricity, the government should do more to protect forests in areas adjoining project sites.

Cambodian NGO Forum asks Sekong River dam developers to consider environmental effects

PHNOM PENH, June 4 (Xinhua) -- The NGO Forum in Cambodia has asked the developers of a series of large dams planned for the Sekong River Basin in southern Laos to pay close attention to their potential environmental impact as fears grow for the tens of thousands of Cambodians living alongside the river's lower stretches, local media reported Wednesday.

"We are really concerned about the potential negative effects on Cambodian people living downstream of the proposed dams," NGO Forum deputy executive director Ngy San was quoted as saying in the Mekong Times newspaper.

The dams could help power the region but it is critical that these environmental concerns are not overlooked, he added.

"We do not want to oppose the government or companies which are developing the dams," he said. "But we need to think about impacts on water quality and aquatic biodiversity ... We need the (Cambodian) government to hold talks with Laos on the matter."

According to a recent report from the Cambodian Mekong River Alliance, Laos has already constructed two hydropower dams on the river, with the Houay Ho dam capable of producing 150 megawatts, and the Xekamen dam to be complete in 2010 250 megawatts, the newspaper said.

The existing dams are believed to have seriously damaged the river's ecological wellbeing both in southern Laos and northeastern Cambodia, affecting the livelihoods of an estimated 30,000 villagers living alongside it, the vast majority of whom are from ethnic minorities, it said.

Cambodian villagers suffer from the impact of dams built in Laos and Vietnam

30 May 2008
By Leang Delux
Cambodge Soir Hebdo
Translated from French by Luc Sâr

Environment defense associations issued sharp criticisms against hydro-electric dams built on the Sesan River in Vietnam, and on the Sekong River in Laos, during a seminar held on Friday 30 May in Phnom Penh. According to these associations, villagers living in the provinces of Stung Treng, Ratanakiri and Mondulkiri suffer from the impact of dams built in Laos and Vietnam.

“Downstream from the dams, the living condition of villagers is deteriorating,” Peak Saven, a representative of the Association for the Environmental and Cultural Preservation, indicated. “Because of the impact of the river stream and the level of water, the quantity of fishes is scarce.” According to Peak Saven, villagers are also contracting diseases.

Kim Sangha, of the Protection of Rivers Network, confirmed that these dams have negative impacts on the livelihood of villagers living downstream from these hydro-electric dams. “They suffer from flooding, the catch less fish than before, and they must move out,” he said. According Kim Sangha also, the dam builders have neglected the environmental impact.

Cambodia plans to open nine hydropower dams by 2019 [-Environmental concerns and human impacts looming]

PHNOM PENH (AFP) — Cambodia will construct controversial Chinese-funded dams as part of a plan to feed its electricity-starved economy, according to government documents obtained Monday by AFP.

The Southeast Asian country will open nine dams of various sizes between 2010 and 2019 to generate 1,942 megawatts of power, according to a government report to parliament obtained by AFP. At least four of the dams will be backed by China.

The US-based International Rivers Network last year said that two Chinese-funded hydroelectric dams already under construction threatened to flood huge swathes of Cambodia's protected forests.

The group said the Kamchay and Stung Atay dams, unchecked by public scrutiny, will wreak havoc on local communities and slow development.

The new government report said the Kamchay hydropower plant will open in 2010, while Stung Atay hydroelectric dam will open in 2012.

"By 2020, all villages will have electric power. (And) by 2030, at least 70 percent of the families countrywide will have electricity use," the report said.

The government also plans to build nine coal-powered plants between 2011 and 2020, the report said.

Only some 20 percent of Cambodian households currently have access to electricity.

Spiralling utility prices, driven by this lack of supply, are a major obstacle to attracting foreign investment, and the government has struggled to find a way to bring down the cost of power.

Planned Lao Dam Raises Concerns on the Mekong

By Andrew Nette
Newsmekong*

PHNOM PENH, Mar 28 (IPS) - The Lao government’s decision earlier this year to press ahead with plans to build the Don Sahong dam on the mainstream of the Mekong River in southern Laos is causing major concern in Cambodia and internationally.

The most advanced of eight hydropower projects mooted for the lower Mekong mainstream, the Don Sahong dam is also ramping up pressure on the Mekong River Commission (MRC), the inter-governmental body charged with managing development on the river.

The Cambodian government appears to be taking the issue seriously. The Foreign Ministry said on Thursday that Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen would pay a one-day visit to Laos to meet with regional officials on issues affecting the Mekong River.

Cambodian NGOs this week called upon their government to ask Laos for an immediate construction moratorium on Dong Sahong to allow for an independent trans-boundary assessment of environmental and social impacts.

In March 2006, the Lao government signed an agreement granting the Malaysian engineering firm Mega First Corp Berhad the exclusive mandate to carry out a feasibility study of the Don Sahong project.

On Feb. 13 this year, the company signed a project development agreement with Vientiane to push ahead with the scheme on a build-own-operate basis.

In a statement to the Malaysian stock exchange, the company said the dam, located in Champassak province two kilometres from the Lao border with Cambodia, would be a run-of-river facility with the capacity to generate between 240 and 360 megawatts of electricity to be sold mainly to Laos and neighbouring countries.

Their statement also said "the feasibility and social/ environmental studies of the proposed Don Sahong Project (show it) to be technically and financially viable." Critics are concerned that these studies have not been publicly released.

The dam will be built on the Mekong mainstream at a location known as Khone Falls, where the River forms a complex network of narrow channels, or ‘hoo’ in Lao, at the point at which it flows into Cambodia.

The dam will block Hoo Sahong, the deepest channel on that section of the river, and the movement of migratory fish that now easily pass through at the peak of the dry season, April to May, when the water level of the Mekong is at its lowest.

This will effectively block the dry season migration of fish between the feeding habitats of the Tonle Sap Lake and upstream breeding zones in Laos and Thailand, critics say. It is also likely to alter water flow patterns in the immediate downstream area, further disrupting migration patterns for fish species sensitive to changes in water levels.

According to a June 2007 briefing paper by the Phnom Penh-based WorldFish Centre, the Khone Falls supports at least 201 fish species, as well as one of the few remaining concentrations of freshwater dolphins in the Mekong.

"In the absence of detailed design information it is not possible to provide a full assessment of the impact of the proposed Don Sahong dam on the Mekong basin fisheries," the brief stated, although "this review of available information shows that the risks are very high."

While no economic valuation of the amount of fish that pass through the channel in the April to May period has been made, fisheries experts believe it is significant.

According to the WordFish Centre brief, 87 percent of the fish species in the Mekong whose behaviour is known, including some of the most commercially important species, are migratory.

Experts believe that the loss of even small percentage of Cambodia’s fisheries catch represents tens of thousands of tonnes and millions of dollars worth of fish.

In an open letter on Don Sahong dam in May 2007, over 30 fisheries scientists stated that Don Sahong "will have grave environmental impacts, particularly on fish and fisheries but also on tourism and other significant aspects of the economy and livelihoods, causing damage that will far exceed net returns from the project".

The Lao government has previously considered the channel of critical importance to migratory fish and specifically banned fishing there at various times between 1960 and 1990.

Informed sources say the project had been the subject of significant discussion in Lao government until the signing of the project development agreement in February put a halt to this.

Don Sahong was the subject of intense debate at a meeting of the Vientiane-based MRC in Siem Reap, Cambodia in November 2007. According to one media report, Cambodian delegates made their frustration clear with what they claimed was a lack of transparency on the part of Laos in relation to the dam.

In response to the February announcement, Lim Kean Hor, Minister for Water Resources and Meteorology and chair of the Cambodian National Mekong Committee (CNMC), said the MRC is studying the impact of the dam and would release a report at the end of 2008.

"The MRC have not ignored the potential problems with the fisheries on the Cambodian side," he said. "After the study is finished we will talk about the benefits and negatives because it is a multi-purpose project." CNMC officials were unavailable to be interviewed at this time about Don Sahong.

Nao Thuok, director general of Fisheries Administration at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in Phnom Penh, confirmed that there have been discussions between the Cambodian and Lao governments about the potential impacts of the dam.

"We have suggested to Lao counterparts that they should study (Don Sahong) carefully before damming and they promised to do so. We just heard recently that they decided to build the dam soon, so it is not clear what the situation is."

It is understood that the MRC has prepared an analysis of the draft environment impact assessment for Don Sahong and economic valuation of the potential impact on fisheries from the project. These documents have not been publicly released.

The issue will also be discussed at the upcoming Joint Committee meeting of the MRC in Vietnam in early April.

In a letter sent this week to CNMC, Cambodian NGOs have requested that their government ask for a moratorium on the dam construction. "During the moratorium period, a comprehensive and participatory scientific transboundary environmental and social impact assessment must be carried out by an independent party," the letter said.

"As part of this scientific assessment, there should be public consultations and discussion between the countries of the lower Mekong region that examine and assess the future costs and benefits of this project to each country, and the poor and vulnerable communities living in affected areas," it added.

While China has completed two dams on the upper Mekong mainstream and construction on a further much larger project is underway, the lower reaches of the river have remained free from dam development until now.

Of the eight dam projects planned for the lower Mekong mainstream, five are in Laos including Don Sahong, two in Thailand and one in Cambodia.

A Chinese company has been undertaking a feasibility study of the Sambor dam in the central Cambodia, although there are mixed reports as to whether the government intends to move ahead on the project.

The English-language ‘Vientiane’ Times reported this week that Laos and Thailand have signed an agreement to allow a private firm to commence feasibility studies into the 1,800-megawatt Ban Kum Kun hydropower dam located on the Mekong mainstream on their border. "The need for a credible and effective river basin management organisation in the Mekong Region has never been more apparent, yet for the MRC a crisis of legitimacy and relevancy is looming," said a statement signed by 51 citizens’ groups and individuals from the six Mekong countries, sent on Mar. 27 to newly appointed MRC Chief Executive Officer Jeremy Bird.

The prospect of extensive hydropower development on the Mekong puts the MRC in a catch-22 situation, said Carl Middleton, a research analyst with Rivers International.

"If the MRC provides advice to government agencies that is perceived as critical of proposed hydropower projects, this advice could be unwelcome, ignored, and then no longer sought, undermining the MRC's relevance in the eyes of the government agencies it considers itself primarily answerable to."

"Yet, by not providing this objective analysis and releasing it into the public domain, as it should do, the MRC faces a crisis of legitimacy in the eyes of the wider public that it is also intended to serve," Middleton added.

(*This story was written for the Imaging Our Mekong Programme coordinated by IPS Asia-Pacific)

Chinese dams threaten Cambodia's forests, farmers

Tue Mar 25, 2008
By Ek Madra

CHAY ARENG RIVER, Cambodia (Reuters) - Along the Chay Areng valley in Cambodia's remote Cardamom mountains, children still scamper barefoot through one of mainland southeast Asia's last remaining tracts of virgin jungle.

If they take the same paths in a few years, they will probably have to be swimming.

Faced with a rapidly growing but power-starved economy, Prime Minister Hun Sen has decided the rivers flowing from one of the few elevated spots in a relentlessly flat country should become its battery pack.

With this in mind, in the last two years he has agreed to at least four Chinese-funded hydropower projects as part of a $3 billion scheme to boost output from a measly 300 MW today to 1,000 MW in a decade, enough to power a small city.

The indigenous communities who have lived off the forests in the Cardamoms since the dawn of time appear to be the ones who will be paying the biggest price.

"We have been living here without a dam for many generations. We don't want to see our ancestral lands stolen," said 78-year-old Sok Nuon, lighting a fire inside her wooden hut nestled in among the trees near the Chay Areng river.

"I do not want to move as it takes years for fruit trees to produce crops. By then, I'll be dead," she said.

WAR ON BLACKOUTS

Few people argue that Cambodia's 14 million people need more power.

After decades of war and upheaval, including the Khmer Rouge "Killing Fields" of the 1970s, the economy has finally taken off, growing at nearly 10 percent a year.

But its antiquated, mainly diesel-fuelled power plants can meet only 75 percent of demand, meaning frequent blackouts and unit prices around twice those of neighboring Thailand and Vietnam -- both factors inhibiting faster expansion.

With the closer ties Hun Sen has cultivated with Beijing in the last five years, Chinese cash and dam-building expertise has become a logical solution to what is one of the inevitable pains of breakneck growth.

"Chinese investment in hydropower is so important for Cambodia's development," Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said in January after meeting with his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi.

But critics maintain that much of the planning is taking place with scant regard for the long-term impact on the environment in a country where (80) percent of people still rely on agriculture for their livelihoods.

"Poorly conceived and developed hydro-power projects could needlessly and irreparably damage Cambodia's river system with serious consequences," said Carl Middleton of the U.S.-based International Rivers Network.

MUDDY WATERS

The Chinese embassy in Phnom Penh denied Beijing was taking any short-cuts in dam construction in Cambodia -- part of a massive aid package designed to ensure a compliant friend in the region.

"They comply with environmental standards and are approved by the Cambodian government," said a Chinese diplomat who did not wish to be named. "We just want to help Cambodia as much as we can."

But the Chay Areng project hardly appears to be a model of transparency.

The deal was signed in late 2006 with China Southern Power Grid Co (CSG), one of China's two grid operators, to build a 260 MW plant at an estimated cost of $200 million and with a completion date of 2015.

With no prior consultation, the first villagers knew of the project was when Chinese engineers turned up this year to start working on feasibility studies -- details of which CSG and the government are reluctant to discuss.

Environmentalists who have conducted their own studies say the dam's lake will cover 110 sq km (42 sq miles) and displace thousands of indigenous people in nine villages.

More than 200 animal species, including elephants, sun bears, leopards and the endangered Siamese crocodile, would be affected upstream, said Sam Chanthy, head of the NGO Forum, a foreign-funded non-governmental organization in Phnom Penh.

Downstream, the delicate ecosystem of the flooded forest, home to some of the world's rarest turtle species as well as hundreds of types of migratory fish, would also be hit by disruptions to water flow, he said.

"It won't take long for these invaluable assets to disappear when the dam is built," said Eng Polo, of wildlife group Conservation International.

(Editing by Ed Cropley)