The Cambodian government recently approved at least three new irrigation dam projects within protected forests of the Cardamom Mountains that overlap with two carbon credit projects, reports Mongabay’s Gerald Flynn. Projects to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD+) aim to combat climate change and support local communities by generating carbon credits for protecting forests. Companies and institutions can buy those credits to offset their own emissions. The recently approved Cambodian dams in Battambang, Koh Kong and Pursat provinces, and their supporting infrastructure, are expected to cause about 5,200 hectares (12,850 acres) of deforestation. “It is true that the construction of these dams and roads will cause significant forest loss,” Suwanna Gauntlett, director of Wildlife Alliance, which co-manages the REDD+ projects, told Flynn. Five hydropower dams already being constructed in the same Cardamom forests have damaged roughly 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres) of forest. Some of these dams have given cover to illegal logging operations within protected REDD+ forests, further expanding the risk posed by opening up old-growth rainforest for development. Local Indigenous leaders told Flynn they’re concerned the dam projects will damage the forest that sustains them without adequately compensating local people. “We receive no benefits at all from the new dams, we get zero benefits,” Rim Sao Si, an Indigenous leader and deputy chief of Chumnoab commune, told Flynn. “It’s like a war against the forest.” In 2014, the Chorng ethnic group, of which Si is a member, successfully protested the construction of the Stung Cheay Areng Dam, a project…This article was originally published on Mongabay
The post New dam approval in Cambodia raises concerns about REDD+ projects first appeared on EnviroLink Network.