Jungle Journey [with Chut Wutty]: Aoral Wildlife Sanctuary

April 7, 2012
Originally posted at: http://jamesstephens.me/jungle-journey-aoral-wildlife-sanctuary/

Slowly, Cambodia’s natural wonders are being chipped away by greed and stupidity.

I was fighting a head cold the day we triple-road a derelict motorbike into the mountains of Aoral Wildlife Sanctuary in Kampong Speu province. The man in charge is Chut Wutty, Director of Cambodia’s Natural Resources Protection Group. In a country where everyone can be bought this non-profit group of volunteers wind up as the sole defenders of a line drawn between protected land and unsustainable exploitation.

This chapter of my trip began by running into Keyla Bebe, a student working for the Pulitzer Centre on a story covering land use in Cambodia and the intertwined social activism scene. It took just a brief conversation to realize that an opportunity existed here to see things and meet people that are well off the beaten path. A few days later Keyla and I met Wutty in his idling 4×4 at the crack of dawn. With only two seatbelts it was time to get comfortable bouncing around in the back, high on cold medication and not exactly sure where we were going.

Just the odd tire puncture thrown in to make it interesting.

To understand where we were going I had to learn a few things about how land use works in Cambodia. An economic land concession (ELC) is an area that has been given to a developer for extractive resource use. The developer/investor is granted rights to remove the forest cover and plant crops and/or mine aggregate resources in exchange for protecting a small parcel of the ELC, providing local jobs, and of course, greasing the palms of politicians and law enforcement. Keep in mind I am simplifying things here for brevity’s sake; for a full and well written description of land use in Cambodia check out Keyla’s writing and photos here.

As we drove through the countryside we were treated to the typical Cambodian landscape; sprawling fields in various states of crop cover, sporadic palms and fruit trees, and a distinct lack of any real forest. The hours dragged on and the mountains were becoming visible in the distance when it was time to make our first stop; a small collection of families producing charcoal from the timber coming off the mountain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0AUfka7RoE

The grey dome structures are pits where the wood is ‘cooked’ into charcoal. The final product is then bundled up for export to the surrounding villages and distant cities where it is used as a cheap alternative to gas and oil. The irony of the situation, however, is that some of the timber being burned for charcoal is much more valuable if sold as lumber for construction.

Checking out the charcoal.

Hunt for ecstasy drug ingredient destroying Cambodia's jungles

Fri, 27 Jun 2008
DPA

Phnom Penh - Clubbers may claim it is the ultimate love drug, but conservationists Friday warned every tablet of MDMA, known as ecstasy, helps destroy Cambodia's already dwindling rainforest. In a highly publicized burn earlier this month, Cambodia destroyed enough confiscated sassafras oil, a key ingredient in the illegal drug, to produce 245 million ecstasy tablets with a street value of approximately 7 billion dollars.

But conservation group Flora and Fauna International (FFI), which has been a key instigator in cracking down on the trade, said in a press release received Friday the drug's users may still not understand the serious damage their habit did to the environment.

"Sassafras oil, produced by boiling the roots of rare Mreah Prew Phnom trees, is illegally distilled in (Cambodian) jungles ... for processing into a chemical used to make ecstasy," the group said.

"To make matters worse, the distillation process itself uses enormous quantities of fuel wood from other rainforest trees."

As well, FFI said, sassafras oil processing plants are typically located beside streams, polluting the pristine water sources of the protected Cardamom mountains in the country's south-west.

The Mreah Prew Phnom tree (cinnamomum parthenoxylon) is a rare tree rated as data deficient by the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species.

FFI said it supports 49 wildlife officers to root out illegal factories and would continue its efforts to keep them from reopening.

It said the Cardamoms cover over 2-million hectares, and its destruction would potentially release 1.4 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide - a serious blow in the fight against climate change.