On March 22, 2024, ADB’s landscape restoration project held its final national workshop at Hyatt Hotel, Phnom Penh, to present and discuss the outputs and lessons from Cambodia’s demonstration sites. The project is funded by the Japan Fund for Prosperous and Resilient Asia and the Pacific.  ICEM – International Centre for Environmental Management and ICRAF – World Agroforestry Centre, are the technical partners responsible for implementing the project.

The workshop was opened by H.E. Dr Eang Sophalleth, Environment Minister, with opening remarks from Ms Jyotsana Varma, ADB’s Country Director.  Other participants included representatives from national and local government line agencies, the community leaders involved, and other local and international stakeholders from the Sangker watershed.

Dr Eang Sophalleth committed to supporting upscaling of the important restoration demonstrations in the project through the MoE’s Circular Strategy on Environment based on clean, clean, and sustainable policies. The Minister emphasized that MoE is actively working to halt illegal activities and to facilitate nation wide forest restoration.

The project focuses on four demonstration sites in the Samlout Watershed in the headwaters of the Sangker River Basin, Battambang Province. It is a collaboration with the local NGO – the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation (MJP), involving communities, local government, the Samlout Multiple Use Area Rangers, and the Provincial Department of Environment. The project is working to rehabilitate degraded areas with a focus on Community Forests, restore native tree species, demonstrate ecological agriculture techniques, support local livelihoods by implementing diversified cropping techniques, introduce fruit and coffee trees, and potentially develop agro-tourism. The project also applies nature-based solutions to improve the hydrology of the watershed and reduce erosion. Put together, the restoration program is increasing the resilience of the farms to climate change, increasing biodiversity, reducing erosion and sediment transport, and increasing the income of participating farmers through livelihood diversification.

The project team introduced the Watershed and its communities and shared lessons from three years of implementation. The team also presented analytical outputs, including the results of hydrology modeling of the River Basin and a proposed strategy to roll out the approach to other degraded areas in the Samlout Watershed. A new interactive, web-based ‘Decision Support System’ (DSS) to be housed in the Ministry of Environment was introduced. The DSS will facilitate management and monitoring in the Watershed, and provide a model for application in other river basins.

Panel sessions with panellists from the project, local and national government, development partners, international NGOs, and communities provided thoughtful insights into how best to collaborate with local communities and replicate the restoration approach in other watersheds in Cambodia.  The workshop was closed by MoE Secretary of State, Dr Sam In who pointed out that the project aligns the Green Angle in the Ministry’s Circular Strategy that tackles the activities of replantation, reforestation, and establishment of nurseries. Also it contributes significantly to the Government’s Pentagonal Strategy in this 7th mandates dealing with the expansion of forest cover.  Dr In reminded participants that the Government is committed to increasing forest cover from 45% to 60% and to achieving carbon-neutral status by 2050.  Systematic forest restoration in Cambodia is a core strategy for meeting those targets.

To read more about the project, click here.

To watch the video about the project, click here.