By Fergal Barry-Murphy

 

BETWEEN 2001 and 2014, the annual rate of forest loss in Cambodia increased by 14.4 percent, the highest rate in the world. In that time, the Southeast Asian nation lost an estimated 1.44 million hectares—or 5,560 square miles—of forest, almost 10 percent of the country’s total area.

 

This shocking figure puts Cambodia far ahead of its Southeast Asian neighbors in terms of forest loss. Vietnam and Malaysia are next worst in the region, both with an annual increase of forest loss of 6.1 percent in the same period. Cambodian rights group Licadho estimates that Cambodia lost 14.6 percent of its 41,300 square miles of forest from 2000-2013, and more than 2 percent in 2013 alone. Wherever you look, the figures are damning.

 

Satellite images published on NASA’s Earth Observatory website this week reveal the staggering extent of the damage caused by deforestation on a vast area on the border of Kampong Thom and Kampong Cham. The first, acquired in 2000, shows vast swaths of untouched forest in the area. The second image, from 2015, paints a very different picture. Much of the forest has been destroyed, replaced by roads, exposed soil, cropland and large-scale rubber plantations.

 

LONG ANALYSIS to be read here https://asiancorrespondent.com/2017/01/satellite-images-reveal-grim-truth-cambodias-forest-loss/

The satellite images are grim - almost all clearings were done in the recent decade. Lost habitats. Gov't must be involved for it to be so rampant.