Charles River Laboratories said it would cooperate with the U.S. Department of Justice officials, and suspended shipments of primates to its U.S. labs from Cambodia.

But as one route for the drug-testing monkeys shut down, another opened wider – from Cambodia to Charles River’s labs in Quebec, Canada.

From massive caged enclosures in provinces near Phnom Penh, long-tailed macaques are now being imported into Canada for human drug testing development in unprecedented numbers, an investigation by the Southeast Asia Globe, Pulitzer Center and Toronto Star has found.

Since Charles River’s February 2023 announcement that it would stop monkey imports to the U.S., the value of Canadian imports of these endangered animals has spiked nearly six times to roughly 62 million USD, federal data shows. Charles River is the only registered importer of macaques from Cambodia in all of Canada.

The import surge has prompted concerns that Canada has now inherited a tainted supply chain that includes wild long-tail macaques, protected animals that may harbor dangerous pathogens. 

“While they’re [Charles River] doing the right thing in the U.S., they’re doing the wrong thing in Canada,” says Dr. Nicholas Dodman, a veterinary medicine expert and professor emeritus at Tufts Veterinary School in Boston. “It’s a kind of back door…They can still do their research, just not in the United States.”

In a statement, a Charles River spokesperson said the company complies with all Canadian regulations and, by abiding by strict protocols, it has ensured “no members of the public have been exposed to any health or safety risks from our facilities.”

The company said its facilities in Canada are part of its “global network” that includes “state-of-the-art operations in over 20 countries.” In a call with investors following the subpoena, Charles River’s CEO said the company quickly pivoted its monkey shipments to countries with “friendly governments” that are “working with us.”

Poached macaques allegedly smuggled into U.S.

Experts and animal rights activists question whether officials here have done enough to vet those imports.

Canadian officials point to numerous quality control checks in place to ensure proper importation of macaques. But a crucial stage of oversight falls to agents in the exporting countries – including two Cambodian government officials who were indicted by the same U.S. investigation that pulled Charles River into an international scandal and sent its stock value tumbling.

Charles River is not facing any charges and has only been subpoenaed.

The small, docile test subjects are used in Charles River’s lab research, including the development of a COVID-19 vaccine. Animals used in such research are supposed to be captive bred, according to international protocols.

The 2022 indictment alleged thousands of monkeys imported into the U.S. were wild macaques that were poached and laundered through the legal trade of the captive-breds. Officials suspect about 2,600 wild macaques entered the U.S. on false permits since 2018.

The same year of the indictment, the status of long-tailed macaques on the Red List of Threatened Species was upgraded to “endangered.” The threat report listed “biological resource use” as a leading cause of the decline of macaques in the wild.

There are good reasons why laboratory animals should not be captured from the wild, says Andrew Knight, veterinary professor of animal welfare at Australia’s Griffith University.

“Scientifically, their genetic composition, and their health or disease status, may be unknown or variable, which can make experimental results less reliable,” he says. “Additionally, there are major animal welfare concerns when primates are captured from the wild, or transported from breeding centres close to wild populations.”

“Human health and animal welfare is paramount”

Canadian regulators should pay more attention to the importation of macaques, not only because of the alleged problems U.S. investigators found but also because Cambodian monkeys could bring diseases, says Lisa Jones-Engel, a senior science advisor with the U.S. activist group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).

“Charles River…went just to the north to Canada and not only did (Canadian officials) not shut it down, but it appears they threw the borders wide open, rolled out the red carpet,” she said. “And Canadian officials are ignoring that monkeys exported from Cambodia have been harboring pathogens that not only represent a deadly zoonotic risk, but the presence of these pathogens further undermines and confounds the use of these monkeys in experimentation.”

In May, Jones-Engel wrote a letter to officials in Ottawa that warned this primate trade is characterized by the “highest risk of zoonotic disease transmission” and that “Canadian residents may be paying the price for this industry’s hazardous practices.”

She told the Globe that the possibility of wild-caught monkeys entering the supply chain “means that this industry is more likely to usher in the next pandemic than it is to prevent it.”

we may produce or import animals carrying infectious agents capable of causing disease in humans

Charles River Laboratories

A recent case study by U.S. researchers tied a case of melioidosis, an infectious disease that can affect both humans and animals, to a Cambodian macaque imported to the U.S. in January 2021. 

The animal was not imported by Charles River, the company said.

In a statement, Charles River said it respects the views of “groups and individuals who deeply oppose the use of animals in human drug testing.”

“However, any factual and fair assessment of how [Charles River] carries out such drug testing would conclude that our commitment to both human health and animal welfare is paramount. We have no doubt that the people whose lives have been saved or immeasurably improved by the drugs we have helped develop would agree with us.”

In addition to COVID vaccines, the company develops drugs to treat cancer, diabetes and rare diseases.

The company did not respond directly to questions about whether wild-caught monkeys could have been included in their Canadian supply chain. In a 2020 form to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Charles River noted that “we may produce or import animals carrying infectious agents capable of causing disease in humans,” which “could be a possible risk of human exposure and infection.” 

The company says its strict protocols include a 30-day quarantine for imported primates and required disease testing, all monitored by Canadian officials. 

Canadian officials echoed Charles River, saying they closely monitor the primates to ensure public safety. 

Dodman, the expert in veterinary medicine, is less certain.

“Grabbing a monkey out of a tree and shipping them to a lab, you’re asking for a health crisis,” he says. “However many precautions they take, they can make mistakes and who knows the incubation time on some of these diseases?”

Oversight relies on permits issued in Cambodia

Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) monitors the importation of animals going to labs. 

To do that, the federal government relies on the Convention for the International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES), which is run by the United Nations, to properly vet the animals’ origin and ensure there is no harm to species’ wild population.  

The officials in Ottawa said they look to ensure the incoming animals have CITES permits issued by officials in the originating country.

But Masphal Kry and Omaliss Keo, the two high-level Cambodian officials indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice, lead the CITES Management Authority in Cambodia that issues the permits Canadian officials say they rely upon.

Kry, who was arrested in the U.S. in November 2022, while on his way to a convention on the international trade of endangered species, is the only one so far who has stood trial. On March 22, he was found not guilty of smuggling and conspiracy to smuggle. His lawyers did not respond to a request for comment.

Despite the indictment, Keo is still listed as the CITES chairman for “terrestrial forest and wildlife resources” in Cambodia. When reached, Keo did not answer specific questions, but responded, “I thank [you] for your email and appreciate your asking (for clarification) and finding truth. I will respond as soon as possible.”

Upon Kry’s verdict and return to Phnom Penh, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries released a statement that read “This misrepresentation [the arrest of Kry] was based on evidence obtained via improper investigations, concealed from Cambodian authorities, and contravening normal practices of cross-border law enforcement norms.”

The press release continued that the allegations against Cambodia regarding the long-tailed macaque trade had no evidence and relied on unfounded assertions disseminated by certain individuals or NGO personnel, disseminated through local unprofessional media and Western mainstream media, aiming to discredit Cambodian officials and influence the court decision.”

Also facing charges are six officials affiliated with Vanny Bio-Research, a major exporter of long-tailed macaques bred for use in research. In a statement, the company said it “denies any wrongdoing.”

The allegations by U.S. prosecutors carry significant implications, said Sarah Kite, co-founder of the international advocacy group Action for Primates, adding that they “raise serious questions regarding how widespread this smuggling operation was — and may continue to be — in Cambodia.”

“By continuing to allow the importation of long-tailed macaques from Cambodia, Canada may be… contributing substantially to the cruelty of trapping, and the decimation of the species in the wild,” Kite continued.

Monkey shipments pivoted to ‘friendly’ countries

While the U.S. government has not officially instituted a ban on the import of Cambodian monkeys, redacted letters from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service show that at least two re-export requests of live long-tailed macaques and biological specimens have been denied since the indictment.

Pierre Verreault, executive director of the Canadian Council on Animal Care, which inspects Charles River facilities and other Canadian labs to ensure animal welfare, says the U.S. government’s probe is a key way to find out whether the supply chain is tainted. “Hopefully, if there’s something wrong there, it will stop.”

In the meantime, Charles River’s movement of macaque importations away from the U.S. has had no significant impact on operations, CEO James Foster said in a September conference call with investors.

While the indictment “was very concerning,” the company pivoted to its “international footprint, which is quite large, we have got great facilities all over.”

“We have friendly governments…working with us…We’re not going to pivot back to the U.S…The preponderance will be done elsewhere,” Foster said.

Charles River is also facing a class action lawsuit from shareholders. The plaintiffs allege that the company “made materially false and/or misleading statements” and failed to disclose that the company had “engaged in illegal activity with respect to its importation of non-human primates for research” including relying on “non-preferred suppliers of animals from Cambodia.”

As a result of the company’s “precipitous decline in market value” following the subpoena, shareholders have suffered “significant losses and damages,” the claim alleges.

Charles River did not respond to questions about the civil lawsuit. In a court filing responding to the allegations, the company denied making any false statements, saying that it “regularly warned investors of the risks of supply interruption” and potential need to rely on alternative suppliers.

“Charles River expressly warned investors about the risk of disruption to its supply of macaques and about the possibility that its operations may not comply with laws, including laws governing the importation of macaques,” the response reads. “Charles Rivers’ warning that it might be required to source products from ‘non-preferred’ vendors demonstrates that the company was being transparent, not attempting to mislead the market.”

Charles River has asked the court to dismiss the civil claim.

~~~

This article was produced by a collaboration between The Toronto Star and Southeast Asia Globe, with support from The Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network.

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However, developments in Cambodia’s lending landscape offer cause for optimism. The explosion in Cambodia’s fintech ecosystem, paired with the growing potential of alternative-data credit frameworks, could provide a path towards financial inclusion for those previously left out of the conversation.

Acccording to Ms. Phal-Chalm Theany, Secretary General of the Association of Banks in Cambodia, “Alternative data has tremendous potential for contributing to financial inclusion by complementing traditional financial data that banks have. They range from information on mobile wallet transactions to information on user behavior on digital platforms that can be utilized for risk assessment of individuals and MSMEs.” 

Most financial institutions use debt repayment history and bank and credit files to determine the creditworthiness of potential borrowers. Driven by digitalisation and developments in technologies such as data analytics and machine learning, alternative credit scoring is based on any form of non-traditional information that can provide insights into the ability and propensity of borrowers to pay back loans. Telecom and utility payment histories, as well as digital footprints and mobile data, can all be utilised to assess creditworthiness within these frameworks.

Banks in Cambodia are increasingly looking to tap alternative data for serving the unbanked and underbanked.

“Data in Cambodia is still very much fragmented and held across multiple organizations and institutions,” said Mr. Mach Chan, CEO of Phillip Bank in Cambodia. “Many people do not have formal loans from financial institutions. This makes it challenging to predict their repayment capacities. If Phillip Bank can easily assess aggregated alternative data, we can better assess a borrower’s creditworthiness based on their social and behavioral indicators, and spending patterns and habits. This allows us to form a more complete picture of the borrower’s risk profile, with opportunities to offer cheaper loans to less risky customers, regardless of whether they are banked. Additionally, many SMEs are not formally registered making lending a challenge. If banks can access the payments data of these MSMEs, the financial Industry will be more confident to support the needs of these businesses.”

Across Southeast Asia, governments, banks and key stakeholders are becoming increasingly interested in the potential of alternative data as a tool to expand the scope and accessibility of financial services.

A Southeast Asia-focused report published by the World Bank Group in 2021 highlights four new data types that have emerged as part of the evolving digital ecosystem, and which can aid credit decision-making: mobile operator and app-based data, digital payments, e-commerce data and enterprise-tech (business-performance) data. Such alternative data has also been highlighted by the Asian Development Bank as one of the key areas for driving financial inclusion in Southeast Asia. 

Across the region, governments, banks and key stakeholders are becoming increasingly interested in the potential of alternative data as a tool to expand the scope and accessibility of financial services.

In December 2022, the National Credit Bureau of Thailand announced the plan to launch a non-credit data centre by consolidating such data into NCB’s existing credit database with initial application of utility payment data from Electricity and Water Utilities.

In Indonesia, Experian collaborated with a telecom company to uplift financial inclusion by using data from telco to provide advanced credit assessment to empower unbanked and underbanked.

In the Philippines, Credit Information Centre (CIC) is working on an open policy to enable accessing entities to utilize credit bureau data with alternative data to come up with a complete picture of a borrower’s credit profile.

In the context of Cambodia, utility bill payment and telco payment data can serve as important sources of alternative credit data. Moreover, with rapid digitalization along with adoption of digital payments, there should be enormous potential to tap a wide array of alternative data on payments and digital footprints. Around the world, such data have served as key drivers for digital financial inclusion. 

With a rise in digital financial service providers, digital payment catalysts and e-commerce in Cambodia, massive amounts of alternative data are already generated at present. Given this scenario, it is important to have an organized ecosystem to collect, process and utilize such alternative credit data.

On the regulatory front, the National Bank of Cambodia revised the prakas on credit reporting in 2020, enabling Credit Bureau Cambodia (CBC) to collect alternative data along with traditional credit data to support financial institutions to strengthen credit risk assessment capabilities.  

CBC was established in 2012 with the support of the National Bank of Cambodia, the Association of Banks   in Cambodia and other key stakeholders in the sector to manage a fair and transparent credit market in support of the nation’s economic development. Since then, CBC has become the leading body providing financial information in the country. Although currently CBC only manages traditional data reported by member banks and financial institutions, it is preparing an ambitious roadmap to collaborate with multiple sectors in the country. Its plan is to establish a comprehensive alternative credit data ecosystem that can work together with the traditional credit data ecosystem for social and economic benefits to Cambodians.

“I would say Cambodia stands a decade ahead of other emerging market economies because of the Credit Bureau and the lending environment,” explained Gordon Peters, co-founder and CEO of fintech firm Boost, which harnesses popular social media platform such as Facebook and Telegram to enable access to finance. “CBC has done a great job of collecting, collating and sharing data on the financial lives of customers,” he said. “I think that is a huge unlock.”

For Peters and company, CBC establishes a level of legitimacy and security that has benefited Cambodia’s financial sector and allowed his firm to fill a gap in the ecosystem. Banks and financial institutions have a high degree of confidence and trust in the role of CBC as a key financial data infrastructure in the country. For a company that already manages credit history data of more than 7 million individuals and businesses, expanding the capabilities to manage alternative data reporting system looks plausible.

Ms. Theany elaborated: “CBC is a data centre for the financial sector that collects data from banks and financial institutions, stores and analyses them for the purposes of credit scoring for those financial institutions. Where each bank and financial institution may have its own data, CBC has the financial information for the whole sector.

“With strong capabilities in data analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning, CBC is uniquely positioned to harness alternative data from diverse data sources to enable banks and financial institutions to conduct better assessment of the profile of the unbanked (mainly women and farmers) and informal small businesses, estimate income with more precision. This shall enable financial institutions to offer more appropriate credits or other financial services in the absence of a financial footprint, credit histories or property guarantees.”

Mr. Chan added: “CBC could spearhead the aggregation of payments, telco and utilities data. These datasets are then fed into a prospective customer’s credit score. Over the past few years, with NBC’s Bakong as a key enabler, we’ve seen a rapid digitization of payments. We believe that when assessing customer creditworthiness, payments data is just as important as borrowing and repayment data, and should be prioritized. At the same time, CBC would need to seek the cooperation of their member financial institutions to provide these datasets. For SMEs, we also see data from GDT as an important asset. If CBC could connect and obtain data with GDT, it will allow the banks to form better assessments for clean loans, spurring economic activity.”

Currently, CBC provides K-Score, an algorithmic credit score (ACS). ACS uses machine-learning algorithms to analyse massive data sets to produce credit scores without traditional financial information. This is the only industry level credit score available in Cambodia. First launched in 2015, CBC did a major revamp of the algorithms in 2020 to keep up with the evolving changes in the market landscape. Today, K-Score is available to all member financial institutions of CBC and (via CBC’s mobile app) to all individuals as well.

A 2023 report in the Asian Journal of Law and Science states: “ACS is the tip of the spear of the global campaign for financial inclusion, which aims at including unbanked and underbanked citizens in financial markets and delivering them financial services, including credit, at fair and affordable prices.” The study outlines the wide ranging benefits of ACS and alternative data as tools to benefit individuals across Southeast Asia who lack access to financial services.

In the Cambodian context, Credit Bureau of Cambodia is well positioned to lead the way in leveraging these tools. To make sense of the massive datasets now available thanks to digitalisation, CBC utilises a host of ACS tools. Machine-learning algorithms and other artificial intelligence mechanisms allow for the analysis of data at a scale that was previously impossible. Risk analysis profiles and loan portfolios that are regularly updated and refined are just a couple of the ways these technologies can be leveraged using alternative data. While the power of these tools is certainly important, CBC’s experience in the sector — and its standing as the leading institution managing, analysing and providing financial data — are the most compelling reasons for the adoption of alternative data schemes in Cambodia.

“As we are entering our second decade of credit reporting in Cambodia, CBC is committed to being a trusted (element in the) national financial infrastructure for providing alternative credit data, to strengthen credit risk assessment for our 190-plus member financial institutions, and to expand access to credit for the new-to-credit consumer segments. We are very open to collaborate with alternative data providers such as telcos, utilities and payment service providers to harness information not found in traditional credit reports, to help more Cambodians obtain access to mainstream financial services,” explained CBC CEO, Oeur Sothearoath.

As CBC leverages its established presence in the financial sector, a growing pool of innovators is working with the agency to develop and facilitate the alternative data ecosystem.

The post Emerging digital technology, alternative data and financial inclusion in Cambodia appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

Six prominent advocates of climate and energy justice have been arrested and detained in Vietnam for their efforts to help wean the country from coal. Among them is environmental justice lawyer Dang Dinh Bach, who is serving a five-year prison sentence. Bach was the founder and director of the Law and Policy of Sustainable Development Research Centre, where he dedicated his life to the public health of marginalised communities. The UN Human Rights Council Working Group on Arbitrary Detention released an opinion earlier this year regarding Bach’s imprisonment, finding it a “violation of international law” and expressing concerns about a “systemic problem with arbitrary detention” of environmental defenders in Vietnam. 

Another leading defender of climate justice in Vietnam, Hoang Thi Minh Hong, founder of the environmental group CHANGE VN, was recently sentenced to three years in prison. To date, the United Nations, United States, United Kingdom and European Union have all released statements condemning her recent conviction and sentencing. 

It is in this context that we urge multilateral development banks like the ADB and World Bank, along with donor governments, not to bulldoze ahead with the plans for implementing the JETP or associated projects. Doing so would mean acting as complicit bystanders in the silencing and reprisals faced by community rights, workers’, environmental and climate advocates.

Elsewhere in the region, including the Philippines and Indonesia, ADB and World Bank Group plans to dole out hundreds of millions of dollars in public funds, to enable coal companies to refurbish or retire their facilities, have been heavily criticised by environmental, climate and social-justice groups. Though these schemes are labelled as contributions to a Just Transition – and are explicitly being considered as part of the JETP arrangements in Indonesia – the reality is that project operators are not being held culpable for the harm and damage wrought by their coal-fired power plants on community livelihoods, workers’ health and the environment. 

Clear promises to retain or provide dignified retirement packages and redress for health impacts for workers remain nonexistent, and proposals for “green jobs” lack commitments that would ensure core labour rights as per international conventions. Instead, the plans being put in place prioritise “repurposing” rather than decommissioning coal plants – allowing facilities that once burned coal to be refurbished to rely upon burning other resource-intensive, high greenhouse gas-emitting fuels such as woody biomass or waste. Meanwhile, workers and residents in surrounding communities will still be left to face the prospect of working and living in areas where the air, land and water are contaminated.

Alarmingly, it appears the same model of “repurposing” coal facilities will be proposed for financing under the Vietnam JETP.  Plans moving forward in the name of Just Transition are being backed by a powerful set of corporate and financial actors. In response, civil society, community groups and workers’ alliances across the region have consistently called for banks and donor governments to establish clear commitments – to ensure there are safe spaces where people can voice concerns and provide feedback, to inform the planning process before plans move to the implementation phase. 

The high-level political declaration announcing the JETP in Vietnam affirmed the importance of consultation with diverse stakeholders, including NGOs and civil society, to achieve a “broad social consensus” on the country’s energy-transition pathway. But the disabling environment for civil society and community-based groups in Vietnam means it is impossible to engage meaningfully in any consultative processes, free of the fear that another of their representatives may be next in line to be arbitrarily detained, charged and imprisoned. The ADB and the World Bank Group also have clear provisions guaranteeing access to information, transparency and public participation enshrined in policy, none of which is possible in the current context in Vietnam. 

Crucially, the Asia Pacific Climate Week and the gatherings associated with the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation should be a time when both the  ADB and World Bank Group finally “walk the talk” by issuing statements that offer support for the release of these environmental and human-rights defenders. More broadly, they must commit to suspending Just Transition-related planning processes and financing until there are safe, meaningful spaces for community, workers’  and civil-society groups to raise questions, concerns and grievances.

Meanwhile, mobilisation by civil-society groups outside of Vietnam, to secure the release of Bach, Hong and other incarcerated environmental and human-rights defenders, will continue. So, too, will collective efforts to advance processes, principles and practices of equitable, rights-based Just Transitions within, across and beyond the region.

Tanya Lee Roberts Davis is the Just Transitions Advocacy Coordinator at NGO Forum on ADB

The post Questioning Development Banks’ Commitments to Just Transition appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

Not far from the truck down an old logging trail, rangers in Cambodia’s Virachey National Park conducted a biodiversity survey within the protected area, much of which is unexplored. The dense forest is one of the last relatively untouched landscapes in the fast-developing Mekong region.

“Logging and poaching is an issue but the park has a way of protecting itself,” said Thon Soukhoun, who has been a ranger since the forest became a national park in 1993. “Nowhere in the country is like Virachey, it is Cambodia’s gem.”

Nestled in the Kingdom’s northeastern corner on the borders of Laos and Vietnam, Virachey was among the first Cambodian forests declared a protected area 30 years ago. At more than 3,300 square kilometres – nearly five times the size of the capital, Phnom Penh – it was the largest national park in the country at the time.

But as Southeast Asia races to cut reliance on fossil fuels, partly through climate finance schemes, Cambodia is risking this regional biodiversity hot spot for renewable energy.

Confidential documents and maps leaked to Southeast Asia Globe from meetings between developers and government officials this year indicate at least two hydropower projects within the park are quietly underway. These files show initial assessment work has begun at the dam sites in the core of Virachey, which is also a heartland for the indigenous communities along Cambodia’s borders.

To counter the thirst for development, researchers are monetising the national park in a different way by putting a dollar sign on Virachey’s value as a potential carbon credit project. This in an attempt to prove the protected area may be worth more standing then if felled.

The stakes of this trade-off are high. Dam construction will threaten endangered species by altering river flow and clear-cutting old-growth trees, according to environmentalists. The same leaked papers also indicate one of the dams will create a 215-hectare reservoir, flooding that section of forest.

Conservationists also fear hydropower dams in Virachey may jeopardise hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of conservation funding from the U.K. for the sake of “clean” energy, the very definition of which they challenge.

“To build a dam within this valuable area within the national park, you would have to create access roads, cut down trees and disturb wildlife,” said Pablo Sinovas, country director for the international conservation nonprofit Fauna & Flora. “I would not call any energy coming out of that ‘clean’.”

In the three decades since Virachey was made a national park, Cambodia has lost more than 30% of its forest cover. Protected areas, often only safeguarded on paper, have been deeply affected by this large-scale logging.

While Virachey hasn’t gone unscathed, the park’s ruggedness protected it from the brunt of this deforestation. The forest is now known by Sinovas and other wildlife experts as a “final frontier” for biodiversity in the Mekong region, due largely to its transboundary habitat for animals migrating across the triple border.

As development discussions continue behind closed doors, Chou Phanith, an associate professor at the Royal University of Phnom Penh specialised in environmental economics, is calculating how many tonnes of carbon dioxide Virachey can absorb and potentially sell as carbon credits.

In Phanith’s words, “money talks”.

If the forest is monetised before dam construction breaks ground, it could lead to a debate about whether or not Virachey is worth more standing than if toppled for hydropower, Phanith said. He pointed out the dams are being proposed in one of the areas with the highest potential for carbon storage.

“If forest ecosystems do not have any economic value, policymakers and the private sector will always regard forest ecosystems as less important than development,” Phanith said. “We calculate the economic value of a functioning forest ecosystem as part of a win-win strategy, where we don’t always block development but force sustainable and responsible development.”

The dam proposals in Virachey aren’t entirely new. The first published document on energy production in the park dates back to a 2009 master plan for hydropower development in Cambodia, backed by the state-run Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

Miyoshi Asagi, counsellor for the Japanese embassy in Cambodia, said JICA’s involvement with these dam developments ended when the masterplan was published.

In August, JICA announced it is developing a new road map to clean energy for Cambodia. Asagi said she is “aware hydropower plants have lots of debate” and that “there are no projects in the pipeline for hydropower.”

An October report by WWF, released before the World Hydropower Congress this month, found that the ecological toll of dams in the Lower Mekong Basin outweighed the rewards of renewable energy.

The report stated “as hydropower development grows, the cascading nature of its impacts could be wider and more significant than understood today.”

The potential dams in Virachey are located on and named after the Prek Liang River. This waterway is a tributary to the Sesan River, which is part of Cambodia’s “3S River Basin”, itself a major tributary to the Mekong River. 

The Mekong is reeling from compounding hydropower pressures, with additional dam developments threatening to further choke off the once-mighty river.

In Cambodia, the government typically provides little transparency for major infrastructure projects. Basic documents such as environmental and social impact assessments are not often made public.

While officials from both the ministries of environment, as well as mines and energy, did not respond to multiple requests for comment, Minister of Environment Eang Sophalleth attended the Cambodia Climate Change Summit in November.

During a question and answer session at the summit, Sophalleth responded to Globe’s inquiry about energy plans in national parks, such as Virachey, by broadly talking about balance and the need to address developments in a “scientific matter”. He then said national security through energy security is a priority.

Sophalleth continued that the ministry “not do things because we feel like doing it”, he said that environmental studies and impact assessments are done “properly… before we decide to do all of this.”

When asked if these documents will be made accessible, he said: “When the public is receptive enough to accept it, to read, to think and to see what we are trying to achieve, yes.”

The leaked files reviewed by Globe, which span several years, indicate an opaque web of four potential companies that were at some point involved in the hydropower plans for Virachey.

Three are developers from South Korea – KTC Company, Kyung An Cable and Korean South-East Power – while the fourth is a Phnom Penh-based electrical equipment supplier called Rich-Grid Technologies. None replied to requests for comment and it is unclear which, if any, are now involved with the project.

“These are very sensitive documents,” said Bunleap Leang, director of the local environmental organisation, 3S Rivers Protection Network (3SPN). He said that involved groups prefer to keep potentially controversial plans under wraps. “If the dam is good from the perspective of the government and the developer then, to them, no one else needs to know.”

Plans may be further along than simple discussions. Bunleap said he confirmed through the 3SPN network that hiring at Tabok village, near one of the proposed dam sites, has already begun.

Virachey tumbles from Cambodia’s lowlands up into the biodiversity hotspot that is the Annamite Mountains, explained the conservationist Sinovas, comparing it to “two worlds converging in the park.”

At the time the sites were studied for potential hydropower, little to nothing was known about the effect these developments would have on biodiversity and forest health, Sinovas noted. But that’s changed in the 15 years since.

“As we started to understand more and more about what was in the park we are realizing its conservation is critical for Cambodian and regional biodiversity,” said Sinovas.

Fauna & Flora has set up roughly 140 camera traps within Virachey, documenting the critically endangered sunda pangolin, northern yellow-cheeked gibbon and a half-dozen other threatened species.

The national park is also the first place large-antlered muntjacs were recorded in Cambodia and is the last possible refuge for kouprey, the Kingdom’s national mammal, which has not been seen in decades.

“Virachey is one of those areas where deforestation levels have been much lower. That is partly why we have all of this wildlife,” Sinovas said. “Doing anything to damage that would not be in the national interest of Cambodia.”

He added the immediate impacts of construction are backed with longer-term threats such as poaching, illegal logging and other forest crimes common in Cambodia’s more accessible protected areas.

Earlier this year, the U.K. embassy in Phnom Penh confirmed about $730,000 is earmarked for Virachey as part of Britain’s global Biodiversity Landscape Fund.

Marc Thayre, deputy head of mission at the embassy, said the “vast majority of the funding” for the Mekong region is bound for Virachey.

“This is designed to increase the value of the park as a park itself,” said Thayre, who hoped the funds “realign the idea of what an asset is” by putting more value to the forest if left standing then if exploited.

Thayre shifted in his seat when asked about the proposed dams.

“If you want to tackle issues, like climate change and biodiversity, then you have to work in all places in the world with all governments,” he said. “We have to be honest with ourselves about the challenge and tradeoff between environment and development. There will always be some tension there.”

He also pointed to the conflict between “building things in national parks” and the “challenge of local communities not having power.”

“The world changes all the time,” he said. “There are always exit strategies written into any programs we do anywhere in the world. I hope that won’t be the case.”

Cambodia’s hunger for development has recently been joined with a craving for carbon credits.

Such credits are intended to limit emissions by preventing deforestation in places that might otherwise be vulnerable to development, such as Virachey. Major polluters then offset their fossil fuel emissions by essentially sponsoring the protection of these forests through carbon credit purchases.

In recent months, Cambodia’s carbon credits have come under scrutiny that goes beyond global questions over the effectiveness of credits as a whole.

The largest registered carbon credit zone is facing allegations of human rights abuses from the global advocacy group Human Rights Watch. In response, the world’s leading carbon credit registry service, Verra, suspended issuing new credits to the Southern Cardamoms REDD+ project.

Cambodia’s appetite to sell carbon credits, however, remains unsatisfied.

With the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity, Phanith studied the feasibility of REDD+ sites in Cambodia and found about 40% of the Kingdom’s total landmass – about 79,200 square kilometres – could be considered for carbon credits.

Virachey stands as one of the top carbon credit prizes.

In research conducted for the centre and viewed by the Globe, Phanith identified three core areas within Virachey with an estimated total carbon storage capacity of 28 million tonnes.

Phanith calculated credits for the park could be worth more than $200 million in total if left as is, depending on the market rate for carbon. He stressed this didn’t even begin to factor in the benefits of healthy hydrology, biodiversity and other ecosystem services.

If the proposed dams are built, they’d be in one of the three core areas identified by Phanith.

“If you want to develop Virachey into hydropower dams, or whatever, make sure the economic value is more than [the cost of carbon]. If it is, go ahead,” he said. “But be willing to pay [that] anyways to offset.”

But dollar signs can’t account for everything.

Forty seven rangers are assigned to Virachey, many are from the indigenous groups who live in the park.

Several are from the approximately 60,000-strong Brau ethnic minority group from Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. To them, Virachey is more than a carbon sink or a potential energy source.

While on patrol, indigenous rangers laughed as they encouraged Globe reporters not to kill the leeches sucking on their arms, legs, neck and right ear. They called it a “forest tax” owed to Virachey. Instead of killing the leaches, rangers smoked tobacco-leaf cigarettes to ward off the blood-suckers.

As the patrol ended for the day, a shivering breeze swept in as the sunset painted the Veal Thom grasslands gold.

Sra Er, who is Brau and leads Virachey’s Taveng Ranger Station, said to set alarms for 2 a.m. for star-gazing.

When the time rolled around, Er was embarrassed.

The night sky was shielded by overcast clouds and the moon’s glare. To make up for the miserably early morning, Er unscrewed a gasoline canister filled with homemade rice wine.

Under the red glow of a headlamp as he sipped the spirit, Er spoke about the Brau peoples’ connection to Virachey, which he said was the reason he became a ranger.

When asked about potential dams in the park, he grew silent and shook his head.

“We care about Virachey and we protect the park from what we can,” he said.

This article was produced by a collaboration between The Japan Times and Southeast Asia Globe, with support from The Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network.

A Khmer-language version of this story can be found here, with translations by Sophanna Lay and Nasa Dip.

The post For renewable energy, Cambodia risks ‘final frontier’ Virachey National Park appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

នៅតាមផ្លូវដើរក្នុងព្រៃ ខ្ញ៉ំដើរតាមឧទ្យានុរក្ស នៅពេលដែលពួកគាត់ធ្វើការសិក្សា អំពីជីវចម្រុះនៅក្នុងតំបន់អភិរក្ស ដែលភាគច្រើននៃតំបន់នោះ នៅមិនទាន់បានគេចូលដល់់នៅឡើយទេ។

នេះជាឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យ ជាតំបន់អភិរក្សធម្មជាតិដ៏ស្រស់ស្អាតមួយ របស់កម្ពុជាដែលមិនមានការរំខានពីខាងក្រៅ ហើយស្ថិតនៅតំបន់មេគង្គដែលមានការអភិវឌ្ឍដ៏លឿន។

លោក ធន់ សុខុន  បានបំពេញការងារជាមន្ត្រីឧទ្យានុរក្ស ចាប់តាំងពីព្រៃនេះត្រូវបានគេកំណត់ជាឧទ្យានជាតិនៅឆ្នាំ ១៩៩៣ បានប្រាប់ខ្ញុំថា៖ «ការកាប់ឈើ និងការដាក់អន្ទាក់ គឺជាបញ្ហា ប៉ុន្តែឧទ្យាននេះក៏មានរបាំងធម្មជាតិការពារខ្លួនឯងដែរ»។

«គ្មានកន្លែងណាដែលដូចទៅនឹងវីរៈជ័យទេ។ វីរៈជ័យគឺជាគ្រាប់ពេជ្ររបស់កម្ពុជា»។

ប្រទេសនៅអាស៊ីអាគ្នេយ៍កំពុងប្រកួតប្រជែងគ្នា កាត់បន្ថយឧស្ម័នកាបូនិកនៅក្នុងវិស័យថាមពល ដោយមួយចំនួនគឺតាមរយៈការផ្តល់នូវមូលនិធិអាកាសធាតុ។ ចំណែកឯកម្ពុជាវិញ កំពុងតែធ្វើសកម្មភាពអភិវឌ្ឍន៏ តំបន់ដែលសំបូរទៅដោយជីវៈចម្រុះរបស់ខ្លួន ដើម្បីបង្កើននូវថាមពលដែលកកើតឡើងវិញ។ 

សកម្មភាពបែបនេះបានធ្វើឱ្យមានការជជែកវែកញែក អំពីផលប៉ះពាល់ដល់ធនធានធម្មជាតិ ក្នុងការទាញយកថាមពលកកើតឡើងវិញមកប្រើប្រាស់។ ក្រុមអ្នកអភិរក្សបារម្ភថា គម្រោងសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនីនៅវីរៈជ័យ នឹងធ្វើឱ្យរាជរដ្ឋាភិបាល [កម្ពុជា] ខាតបង់ជំនួយរាប់សែនផោនពីប្រទេសអង់គ្លេស ដែលគាំទ្រដល់ថាមពល «ស្អាត» ហើយនេះគឺជាអ្វីដែល ក្រុមអ្នកអភិរក្សព្យាយាមទប់ស្កាត់ ដើម្បីកុំឱ្យមានការកាប់បំផ្លាញ។

ដើម្បីទប់ស្កាត់នូវការអភិវឌ្ឍ ក្រុមអ្នកស្រាវជ្រាវបានប្រែក្លាយវីរៈជ័យទៅជាព្រៃដែលរកចំនូលបាន តាមរយះសក្ដានុពលឥណទានកាបូន។ នេះជាការព្យយាមបង្ហាញថាតំបន់ការពារមានតម្លៃលើសលប់ បើពុំមានការប៉ះពាល់ផ្ដេសផ្ដាស។

ស្ថិតនៅភូមិភាគឦសាននៃប្រទេសកម្ពុជា វីរៈជ័យស្ថិតក្នុងចំណោមព្រៃដំបូងដែលត្រូវបានប្រកាសជាតំបន់អភិរក្ស នៅឆ្នាំ ១៩៩៣។

ដោយមានផ្ទៃដីជាង ៣,៣០០គីឡូម៉ែត្រការ៉េ ទំហំប្រមាណជិតប្រាំដងនៃរាជធានីភ្នំពេញ វីរៈជ័យគឺជាឧទ្យានជាតិដ៏ធំជាងគេបង្អស់ នៅក្នុងប្រទេសកម្ពុជានាពេលនោះ។ 

អំឡុងពេលបីទស្សវត្សរ៍មកនេះ  កម្ពុជាបានបាត់បង់ព្រៃច្រើនជាង៣០ភាគរយនៃព្រៃសរុប រួមទាំងឧទ្យានជាតិផងដែរ ដែលភាគច្រើនត្រូវបានអះអាងថាជាព្រៃអភិរក្សត្រឹមតែលើឯកសារ ប៉ុន្តែជាក់ស្តែងទទួលរងនូវផលប៉ះពាល់ ពីការកាប់ឈើទ្រង់ទ្រាយធំ។ 

ខណៈ វីរ់ៈជ័យមិនទាន់រងផលប៉ះពាល់ សភាពរឹងមាំ និងក្រាស់ឃ្មឹករបស់ព្រៃនេះបាន ការពារវាពីកាប់បំផ្លាញដ៏ធ្ងន់ធ្ងរ ហើយត្រូវបានអ្នកជំនាញចាត់ទុកជា «ដង្ហើមការពារចុងក្រោយ» សម្រាប់ជីវចម្រុះនៅតំបន់មេគង្គ។ នេះក៏ពីព្រោះ​តែវា​ជាដែនជម្រកសត្វព្រៃដ៏សម្បើម ដែលអនុញ្ញាតឲ្យសត្វព្រៃ អាចបម្លាស់ទីឆ្លងកាត់ទឹកដីប្រទេសកម្ពុជា ឡាវ និងវៀតណាមបាន។

ប៉ុន្តែគម្រោងសាងសង់ថាមពលវារីអគ្គីសនី នឹងបង្អាក់នូវអនាគតរបស់ព្រៃមួយនេះ។

ផែនការសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនីយ៉ាងតិចពីរនៅវីរៈជ័យ ដែលគាំទ្រដោយរដ្ឋាភិបាលកម្ពុជា អាចនឹងបង្កផលប៉ះពាល់ដល់តំបន់អភិរក្សនេះ។

បើយោងទៅតាមក្រុមអ្នកជំនាញបរិស្ថាន ដំណើរការសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី នឹងគំរាមកំហែងដល់សត្វដែលកំពុងរងគ្រោះ និងជិតផុតពូជ ដោយសារតែបម្រែបម្រួលនូវចរន្តទឹកធម្មជាតិ ដែលធ្វើឱ្យជម្រកសត្វត្រូវលិចលង់ ព្រមទាំងការកាប់ឆ្ការដើមឈើធំៗ។ អ្នកអភិរក្សក៏មានការព្រួយបារម្ភផងដែរថា ការសាងសង់ផ្លូវទៅកាន់គម្រោងទំនប់ទាំងនេះ អាចនឹងបើកឱកាសឱ្យឧក្រិដ្ឋកម្មសត្វព្រៃ និងព្រៃឈើ ដែលកើតមានជាទូទៅនៅក្នុងតំបន់ការពារផ្សេងៗ រាតត្បាតដល់វីរៈជ័យ ។  
ក្រុមអ្នកអភិរក្សបានជម្រុញថា អគ្គីសនីណាដែលបានផលិត និងបង្ករផលប៉ះពាល់បរិស្ថាន មិនអាចរាប់ជាថាមពល «ស្អាត» នោះទេ។  ជាពិសេសប្រសិនបើការអភិវឌ្ឍធ្វើឱ្យប៉ះពាល់ដល់កេរ្តិ៍ឈ្មោះ របស់ឧទ្យាជាតិវីរៈជ័យ ដែលគេចាត់ទុកជា ឧទ្យានបេតិកភណ្ឌអាស៊ាន និងជាព្រៃអភិរក្សដែលមានទំហំទឹកប្រាក់ ៦០០,០០០ ផោន ដែលជាជំនួយទទួលបានពីស្ថានទូតអង់គ្លេសប្រចាំកម្ពុជា។

ស្របពេលដែលកិច្ចពិភាក្សាអំពីការអភិវឌ្ឍ សុទ្ធសឹងជាការប្រជុំបិទទ្វារ សាស្ត្រាចារ្យរង លោក ជូ ផានិត នៅសាកលវិទ្យាល័យភូមិន្ទភ្នំពេញ កំពុងតែសិក្សាទៅលើបរិមាណនៃឧស្ម័នកាបូនិក ដែលឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យអាចស្រូបយកបាន ហើយថែមទាំងអាចដោះដូរជាមួយនឹង ជំនួយទៅលើការកាត់បន្ថយឧស្ម័នកាបូនិក។ លោក ផានិត បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា នេះជា «ការពិភាក្សាអំពីផលប្រយោជន៍»។

លោកមានប្រសាសន៍ថា ប្រសិនបើជំនួយមកដល់មុនពេលគម្រោងសាងសង់វារីអគ្គីសនីចាប់ផ្តើមនោះ គេអាចនឹងថ្លឹងថ្លែងអំពីផលប្រយោជន៍ រវាងការរក្សាទុក និងការអភិវឌ្ឍវារីអគ្គីសនី ថាមួយណាផ្តល់ផលចំណេញច្រើនជាង ជាពិសេសនៅពេលដែលគម្រោងនេះ ត្រូវបានគេដាក់ស្នើរឱ្យមានការសាងសង់នៅក្នុងបរិវេណ ដែលអាចស្រូបយកឧស្ម័នកាបូនិកបានច្រើន។

«ប្រសិនបើប្រព័ន្ធអេកូឡូស៊ីរបស់ព្រៃ មិនបានផ្តល់នូវផលប្រយោជន៍សេដ្ឋកិច្ច អ្នកនយោបាយ និងក្រុមហ៊ុនឯកជន នឹងតែងតែចាត់ទុកការអភិវឌ្ឍសេដ្ឋកិច្ចមានសារៈសំខាន់ជាងជាអេកូឡូសុី»។ លោកផានិត បានមានប្រសាសន៍។ លោកបានបន្តថា៖ «យើងថ្លឹងថ្លែងគុណតម្លៃសេដ្ឋកិច្ច នៃអេកូឡូស៊ីរបស់ព្រៃឈើ ជាផ្នែកមួយនៃយុទ្ធសាស្ត្រឈ្នះឈ្នះ។ នេះមានន័យថា យើងមិនមែនរារាំងរាល់សកម្មភាពអភិវឌ្ឍន៏ទាំំងអស់នោះទេ ប៉ុន្តែយើងដាក់គំនៀប ដើម្បីឱ្យការអភិវឌ្ឍប្រព្រឹត្តទៅដោយចីរភាព និងមានទំនួលខុសត្រូវ»។

គម្រោងសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនីទ្វេរដង

គម្រោងអភិវឌ្ឍវារីអគ្គីសនីនៅវីរៈជ័យ បានផ្អាកដំណើរការជាយូរមកហើយ។ របាយការណ៍ចុងក្រោយ ទាក់ទងនឹងការផលិតអគ្គីសនីនៅឧទ្យានជាតិខាងលើនេះ បានចេញជាលើកដំបូងនៅឆ្នាំ ២០០៩ ដែលជា ផែនការមេសម្រាប់អភិវឌ្ឍវារីអគ្គីសនី នៅប្រទេសកម្ពុជា ដែលទទួលបានការជួយជ្រោមជ្រែង ពីគម្រោងរបស់ទីភ្នាក់ងារសហប្រតិបត្តិការអន្តរជាតិជប៉ុន ឬចៃកា (JICA) របស់រដ្ឋាភិបាលជប៉ុន។

លោកស្រី Miyoshi Asagi ទីប្រឹក្សាអមស្ថានទូតជប៉ុនប្រចាំកម្ពុជា បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «អង្គការចៃកាមិនជាប់ពាក់ព័ន្ធក្នុងការសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនីនេះទេ»។ លោកស្រីបានបន្តថា៖ «ពួកយើងបានចូលរួមក្នុងការស្រាវជ្រាវ និងផែនការមេដែលបានធ្វើរួច ការពាក់ព័ន្ធរបស់អង្គការចៃកា បានបញ្ចប់ហើយ»។

ប្រទេសជប៉ុន ត្រូវបានគេចាត់ទុក ជា​ ម្ចាស់ជំនួយដ៏សំខាន់ របស់កម្ពុជា។ ប្រទេសទាំងពីរបានរំលឹក ខួប ៧០ឆ្នាំ នៃទំនាក់ទំនងការទូត ក្នុងឆ្នាំនេះ។
នៅខែសីហា អង្គការចៃកាបានប្រកាសនូវ ផែនការថ្មីដើម្បីថាមពលស្អាត សម្រាប់ការអភិវឌ្ឍប្រទេសកម្ពុជា។ លោកស្រី Asagi មានប្រសាសន៍ថា គាត់ «ជ្រាបអំពីការជជែកវែកញែកជាច្រើន​ ពាក់ព័ន្ធនឹងវារីអគ្គីសនី» ហើយលោកស្រីបានលើកឡើងថា «មិនមានគម្រោងអភិវឌ្ឍវារីអគ្គីសនីនោះទេ»។

សំណុំឯកសារ រួមទាំងផែនទីសាងសង់ដ៏សម្ងាត់ ត្រូវបានគេបានលើកយកមកពិភាក្សាក្នុងកិច្ចប្រជុំនៅឆ្នាំនេះ ដោយមានការចូលរួមពីអ្នកអភិវឌ្ឍន៍ និងមន្ត្រីរដ្ឋាភិបាលកម្ពុជា ដែលបានសង្កត់ធ្ងន់ទៅលើគម្រោងសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី។ គម្រោងសាងសង់ទំនងជាមិនបង្អង់យូរទៀតនោះទេ។ យោងតាមការកាសែត The Japan Times បានបង្ហាញថា ការសិក្សា និងវាយតម្លៃអំពីការសាងសង់បាននឹងកំពុងចាប់ផ្តើមហើយ។

យោងទៅតាមឯកសារជាច្រើនបានបង្ហាញ នូវការអភិវឌ្ឍទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី បីកន្លែងដ៏មានសក្តានុពល ស្ថិតក្នុងឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យ ដោយដាក់ឈ្មោះតាមទន្លេព្រែកលៀង ជាដៃទន្លេហូរចាក់ចូលទៅទន្លេសេសាន ដែលជាផ្នែកនៃ «ទន្លេ៣» ក្នុងប្រទេសកម្ពុជា។ 

ទន្លេសេកុង ទន្លេសេសាន និងទន្លេស្រែពក គឺជាដៃទន្លេមេគង្គ ដែលកំពុងរងផលប៉ះពាល់ដោយសារតែ ការប្រមូលផ្តុំនៃទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី ជាមួយនឹងការអភិវឌ្ឍទំនប់​ បន្ថែម ដែលគំរាមកំហែងដល់ទន្លេមេគង្គ ដែលកាលពីមុនមកមិនធ្លាប់មានការអភិវឌ្ឍច្រើនបែបនេះឡើយ។

គ្មានឯកសារណាមួយ រាប់តាំងពីការវាយតម្លៃផលប៉ះពាល់បរិស្ថាន ដល់ការសិក្សាអំពីលទ្ធភាព ត្រូវបានបង្ហាញជាសាធារណៈដោយរដ្ឋាភិបាលកម្ពុជា ឬអ្នកអភិវឌ្ឍន៍ឡើយ។

លោក លាង ប៊ុនលៀប នាយករបស់អង្គការបណ្តាញការពារទន្លេបី សេសាន ស្រែពក សេកុង (3SPN) មានប្រសាសន៍ថា «‍ឯកសារទាំងនេះជារឿងដ៏រសើប»។ លោកបានបន្តថា អ្នកដែលពាក់ព័ន្ទចង់​រក្សា​ផែនការដ៏​ចម្រូងចម្រាសនេះជារឿងសម្ងាត់។ «ប្រសិនបើរដ្ឋាភិបាល និងអុ្នកអភិវឌ្ឍន៍យល់ឃើញថា សំណង់នេះមានប្រយោជន៍ អញ្ចឹង​សម្រាប់ពួកគាត់ គឺគ្មាន​នរណាម្នាក់ចាំបាច់ដឹងអំពីដំណឹងនេះទេ»។

ផែនការសាងសង់នេះ អាចមិនត្រឹមតែជាការពិភាក្សាធម្មតាទេ។ លោក ប៊ុនលៀប បានបញ្ជាក់តាម​រយៈ​បណ្តាញ 3SPN ថា មានការជ្រើសរើសកម្មករឱ្យមកបម្រើការ​នៅ​ភូមិ​តាបុក ស្ថិតនៅក្បែរកន្លែងមួយ ដែលគេគ្រោងនឹងសាងសង់ទំនប់ក្នុងចំណោមទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនីជាច្រើនទៀត បានចាប់ផ្តើមហើយ។ 

ឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យស្ថិតក្រោមដែនសមត្ថកិច្ចរបស់ក្រសួងបរិស្ថាន ចំណែកក្រសួងរ៉ែ និងថាមពល ជាអ្នកដឹកនាំគម្រោងសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គិសនី តែខាងក្រសួងទាំងពីរ មិនបានឆ្លើយតបទៅនឹងសំណើរសុំការអត្ថាធិប្បាយលើដំណាក់កាលអភិវឌ្ឍទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនីទេ ។

ការចំណាយដ៏ច្រើនទៅលើការផលិតថាមពលស្អាត

ព្រែកលៀងគឺជាសរសៃឈាមដ៏សំខាន់របស់វីរៈជ័យ ហើយគម្រោងអភិវឌ្ឍន៍ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី ក៏ស្ថិតនៅក្នុងឧទ្យានជាតិនេះដែរ។ 

លោក Pablo Sinovas នាយករបស់អង្គការសត្វព្រៃ និងរុក្ខជាតិអន្តរជាតិប្រចាំកម្ពុជា (Fauna & Flora) នៅកម្ពុជា ពន្យល់ថា ចាប់ពីតំបន់ទំនាបនៃឧទ្យាននេះ ដែលស្ថិតក្នុងទឹកដីប្រទេសកម្ពុជា រហូតដល់តំបន់ដ៏សំខាន់សម្រាប់ជីវៈចម្រុះ ដែលជា ជួរភ្នំអណ្ណាម ប្រៀបដូចជា «ពិភពពីរជួបគ្នានៅឧទ្យានតែមួយ»។ 

លោក Sinovas កត់សម្គាល់ថា នៅពេលដែលតំបន់ទាំងនោះត្រូវបានគេសិក្សាដើម្បីសាងសង់វារីអគ្គិសនី គេស្ទើរតែមិនបានដឹងអំពីផលប៉ះពាល់របស់វា ទៅលើជីវចម្រុះ និងព្រៃឈើឡើយ។ 

ប៉ុន្តែអ្វីៗបានប្រែប្រួលនារយៈពេល ១៥ឆ្នាំក្រោយ។

លោក Sinovas មានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «នៅពេលដែលយើងចាប់ផ្តើមយល់កាន់តែច្រើន អំពីលក្ខណះពិសេសនៃតំបន់នេះ យើងក៏ចាប់ផ្តើមភ្ញាក់ខ្លួនថា ការអភិរក្សមានសារៈសំខាន់ដល់ជីវចម្រុះក្នុងតំបន់​​ និងសម្រាប់កម្ពុជា​»។

អង្គការ Fauna & Flora  បានដំឡើងកាមេរ៉ាប្រមាណ ១៤០គ្រាប់ នៅវីរៈជ័យ ដោយធ្វើការផ្តិតយករូបភាពសត្វកំពុងរងគ្រោះ និងជិតផុតពូជ ដូចជាសត្វឈ្លូសយក្ស (large-antlered muntjac) សត្វទោចថ្ពាល់លឿង (northern yellow-cheeked giboon) និងសត្វមួយចំនួនទៀត។

ឧទ្យានជាតិនេះគឺជា ជម្រកដំបូងដែលសត្វឈ្លូសយក្សបង្ហាញខ្លួន ហើយជាកន្លែងដែលវាត្រូវបានគេធ្វើកំណត់ហេតុ និងជាជម្រកចុងក្រោយសម្រាប់គោព្រៃ ដែលជាសត្វថនិកសត្វតំណាងប្រទេសកម្ពុជា ដែលបានបាត់ខ្លួនអស់ជាច្រើនទសវត្សរ៍មកហើយ។

លោក Sinovas បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «វីរៈជ័យគឺជាតំបន់មួយដែលអត្រាកាប់បំផ្លាញព្រៃឈើមានកម្រិតទាប»។ លោកបានបន្តថា់៖ «នេះជាមូលហេតុមួយដែលសត្វទាំងនេះនៅមានជីវិត»។

«ការធ្វើអ្វីមួយដែលប៉ះពាល់ដល់ជីវៈចម្រុះ មិនមែនជាផលប្រយោជន៍ជាតិ (កម្ពុជា) នោះទេ» លោកបានបន្ថែម។ 

ក្រៅពីផែនការសាងសង់ទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី ឯកសារនេះបានបង្ហាញថា វារីអគ្គីសនីត្រឹមតែមួយប៉ុណ្ណោះ អាចធ្វើឲ្យដីព្រៃចំនួន ២១៥ហិកតា​ នឹងត្រូវលិចលង់ ដោយសារបរិមាណទឹកដ៏សម្បើម របស់អាងស្តុកទឹកនៃវារីអគ្គីសនី។

លោកបានបន្តថា៖ «ជាក់ស្តែងថាមពលស្អាត ពិតជាសំខាន់ណាស់» ក្នុងកាត់បន្ថយនូវបម្រែបម្រួលអាកាសធាតុ។ ប៉ុន្តែ «វាក៏អាស្រ័យទៅតាមតំបន់ និងអាស្រ័យទៅតាមរបៀបផលិតវាដែរ»។ 

សម្រាប់គាត់ វីរៈជ័យមិនមែនជាកន្លែងសម្រាប់វារីអគ្គីសនីទេ។

លោក Sinovas បានបន្តថា៖ «ដើម្បីសាងសង់ទំនប់នៅក្នុងឧទ្យានជាតិផ្ទាល់ អ្នកនឹងត្រូវបង្កើតផ្លូវ កាប់ដើមឈើ និងបង្ករការរំខានដល់សត្វព្រៃទៀត»។ «ខ្ញុំមិនហៅថាមពលដែលចេញមកពីកន្លែងនោះថា [ថាមពល] ស្អាតនោះទេ»។

កាលពីដើមឆ្នាំនេះ ស្ថានទូតអង់គ្លេសប្រចាំកម្ពុជា បានបញ្ជាក់ថា នឹងផ្តល់ប្រាក់ប្រមាណ ៦ សែនផោន ដល់ឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យ ដែលជាផ្នែកមួយនៃ មូលនិធិការពារតំបន់ទេសភាពជីវៈចម្រុះ របស់ចក្រភពអង់គ្លេស។ លោក Marc Thayre ជាអនុប្រធានបេសកកម្មនៅស្ថានទូតអង់គ្លេស បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា «ជំនួយភាគច្រើន» ដែលបានផ្តល់ជូនប្រទេសនៅតំបន់មេគង្គ ក្នុងនោះឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យទទួលបានច្រើនជាងគេ។ 

លោក Thayre មានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «ជំនួយនេះត្រូវបានគេធ្វើឡើង ដើម្បីលើតម្កើននូវគុណសម្បត្តិនៃតំបន់នេះ»។ «យើងត្រូវបង្វែរឱ្យពួកគាត់មកគិតសារជាថ្មី អំពីគុណតម្លៃនៃតំបន់ ហើយទប់ស្កាត់កុំឱ្យមានការទាញយកផលប្រយោជន៍ ពីធនធានធម្មជាតិនៅតំបន់នេះ ជាជាងអភិវឌ្ឍន៍»។ 

លោក Thayre ផ្អាកនិយាយបន្តិចមុនពេលគាត់ឡើងអង្គុយលើម៉ូតូ នៅពេល [ខ្ញុំ] សួរគាត់អំពីគម្រោងអភិវឌ្ឍវារីអគ្គីសនី។

«ប្រសិនបើអ្នកចង់ដោះស្រាយបញ្ហា ដូចជាបម្រែបម្រួលអាកាសធាតុ និងជីវៈចម្រុះ អ្នកត្រូវធ្វើការជាមួយរដ្ឋាភិបាលទាំងអស់គ្រប់ទីកន្លែង» លោក Thayre មានប្រសាសន៍។ «យើងត្រូវស្មោះត្រង់ជាមួយខ្លួនយើង អំពីបញ្ហា និងការសម្របសម្រួលផលប្រយោជន៍ រវាងបរិស្ថាន និងការអភិវឌ្ឍ។ ត្រង់នោះហើយជាចំណុចដ៏តឹងសសៃក» លោកបានបន្ថែម។ 

លោកសម្គាល់ថា គម្រោងនេះបង្ហាញនូវជ្រុងពីរផ្សេងគ្នា រវាង «ការសាងសង់វារីអគ្គីសនីនៅក្នុងឧទ្យានជាតិ» និង «តម្រូវការអគ្គីសនីរបស់ប្រជាជនក្នុងសហគមន៍»។

លោកបន្ថែមថា៖ «ពិភពលោកប្រែប្រួលគ្រប់ពេល»។ «រាល់គម្រោងដែលយើងធ្វើនៅគ្រប់ទីកន្លែង គេតែងឃើញមានយុទ្ធសាស្ត្របញ្ចាប់បេសកម្ម សរសេរនៅក្នុងឯកសារ។ ខ្ញុំសង្ឃឹមថា នេះមិនមែនជាបញ្ហាឡើយ»។

ការពឹងផ្អែកលើឥណទានកាបូន

ការអភិវឌ្ឍនៅកម្ពុជា មានការផ្សារភ្ជាប់ទៅនឹង ការស្វែងរកជំនួយតាមឥណទានកាបូន។

ឥណទានកាបូន គឺជាជំនួយដើម្បីកាត់បន្ថយការបញ្ចេញឧស្ម័នផ្ទះកញ្ចក់ ដោយបញ្ចៀសនូវកាប់បំផ្លាញព្រៃឈើនៅគ្រប់ទីកន្លែង ដោយសារការអភិវឌ្ឍ។ ឧទាហរណ៍មានដូចជា​​ ដូចឧទ្យានជាតិវីរៈជ័យជាដើម។ ក្រុមប្រទេសឧស្សាហកម្មដែលបង្កការបំពុលធំៗ ទូទាត់ការបំភាយឥន្ធនៈហ្វូស៊ីលរបស់ពួកគេ ដោយឧបត្ថម្ភជាដល់ការការពារព្រៃឈើទាំងនេះ តាមរយៈការទិញឥណទានកាបូន។

ក៏ប៉ុន្តែនាប៉ុន្មានខែថ្មីៗនេះ ការផ្តល់នូវឥណទានកាបូនដល់ការកាត់បន្ថយឧស្ម័នផ្ទះកញ្ចក់របស់កម្ពុជា ​បានស្ថិតនៅក្រោមការតាមដានម៉ត់ចត់ អំពីប្រសិទ្ធិភាពនៃជំនួយនេះ។ 

តំបន់ឥណទានកាបូនដែលបានចុះបញ្ជីធំជាងគេ កំពុងប្រឈមមុខនឹង ការចោទប្រកាន់ពីការរំលោភសិទ្ធិមនុស្ស ពីអង្គការឃ្លាំមើលសិទ្ធិមនុស្ស (Human Rights Watch)។ ជាការឆ្លើយតប សេវាចុះបញ្ជីឥណទានកាបូនឈានមុខគេរបស់ពិភពលោកហៅថា Verra បានផ្អាកការចេញឥណទានថ្មី ដល់គម្រោងរេដបូកក្រវាញខាងត្បូង។

គោលបំណងរបស់កម្ពុជាក្នុងការទាក់ទាញនូវឥណទានកាបូន នៅមិនទាន់មានការប្រែប្រួលឡើយ។ 

ដោយធ្វើការជាមួយនឹងមជ្ឈមណ្ឌលអាស៊ានសម្រាប់ជីវចម្រុះ លោក ផានិត បានសិក្សាពីលទ្ធភាពនៃទីតាំង គម្រោងរេដបូក (REDD+) នៅប្រទេសកម្ពុជា ហើយបានរកឃើញប្រហែល ៤០ភាគរយ នៃផ្ទៃដីសរុបរបស់កម្ពុជា ប្រហែលនឹង ៧៩,២០០គីឡូម៉ែត្រការ៉េ អាចត្រូវបានគេពិចារណាសម្រាប់ ការផ្តល់ឥណទានក្នុងការកាត់បន្ថយឧស្ម័នផ្ទះកញ្ចក់។

តំបន់ដ៏ធំនៃឧទ្យាននេះនៅតែមិនទាន់មានគេចូលទៅដល់ ដោយមានព្រៃឬស្សីក្រាស់ឃ្មឹក លាយឡំនឹងព្រៃបៃតង និងព្រៃរបោះ។ មានតែផ្លូវសម្រាប់ចូលទៅកាប់ឈើក្នុងព្រៃប៉ុណ្ណោះ ជាផ្លូវដែលអាចធ្វើថ្មើរជើងបាន ដោយ​មាន​មន្ត្រី​ឧទ្យានុរក្សយក​ចិត្ត​ទុក​ដាក់​ និងមិន​ឲ្យ​អ្នករួមដំណើរបន្សល់ដានចេញជាផ្លូវថ្មីឡើយ។ 

លោកផានិត បានកំណត់តំបន់ស្នូលចំនួនបីនៅវីរៈជ័យ ដែលមានសមត្ថភាពស្រូបឧស្ម័នកាបូនខ្ពស់ជាងគេបង្អស់ រហូតដល់ទៅ ២៨លានតោន។ តាមរយះ លំនាំគណនាបរិមាណបំភាយឧស្ម័នផ្ទះកញ្ចក់ ចំនួននេះស្មើនឹងការបំភាយឧស្ម័នប្រចាំឆ្នាំសរុប របស់រោងចក្រផលិតថាមពលធ្យូងថ្មជិត ២៥ រោងចក្រ។

​មានតម្លៃ​មធ្យម ១០ដុល្លារ ក្នុង​មួយ​តោន ក្នុងនោះលោក ផានិត បាន​គណនា​ថា វីរៈជ័យ​អាច​មាន​តម្លៃដល់ទៅ ២៨០លាន​ដុល្លារ ​ប្រសិន​បើមិនមានការឈូសឆាយ។ លោក​បាន​សង្កត់​ធ្ងន់​ថា នេះ​ [យើង] មិន​បានគិតអំពីកត្តា​ផល​ប្រយោជន៍ ​នៃ​ជលសាស្ត្រ​ដែល​មាន​សុខភាព​ល្អ ជីវចម្រុះ និង​សេវា​ប្រព័ន្ធ​អេកូឡូស៊ី​ផង​។

លោក ផានិត បានពន្យល់ថា ការលើកទឹកចិត្តផ្នែកហិរញ្ញវត្ថុនាំឱ្យមានរបៀបមធ្យោបាយចំនួនពីរ។

មធ្យោបាយទីមួយ ប្រសិនបើព្រៃឈើមានតម្លៃខ្ពស់ជាង សក្ដានុពលអភិវឌ្ឍន៍ នោះអ្នកបង្កើតគោលនយោបាយ នឹងផ្អាកគម្រោងដោយឯងៗ។ មធ្យោបាយ​ទីពីរ ​ដែល​កម្ពុជា​ដើរ​ជា​ញឹក​ញាប់ គឺព្រៃឈើ​បង្កើត​ប្រាក់ចំណូល បាន​តិច​ជាង​​តម្លៃដែលទទួលបានពីការ​អភិវឌ្ឍ​។

ប្រសិនបើមានមធ្យោបាយទីរពីរត្រូវបានអនុវត្ត មានន័យថា ទំនប់​វារីអគ្គីសនីព្រែក​លៀង​ នឹង​ត្រូវ​សាងសង់​នៅ​កណ្តាល​តំបន់​ស្នូល​មួយ​ ក្នុង​ចំណោម​តំបន់​ស្នូល​ទាំង​បី​ដែល​បង្ហាញ​ដោយលោក ផានិត។ នៅក្នុងករណីនោះ លោកផានិត បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា យ៉ាងហោចណាស់ក៏មានតម្លៃដែលគេដឹង ដើម្បីឱ្យក្រុមហ៊ុនត្រូវបង់ និងទូទាត់សងការខូចខាតព្រៃឈើដែរ។

«ប្រសិនបើចង់អភិវឌ្ឍវីរៈជ័យឱ្យទៅជាទំនប់វារីអគ្គីសនី ឬជាអ្វីផ្សេង ត្រូវប្រាកដថា វាបង្កើតចំណូលបានលើស ២៨០លានដុល្លារ។ ប្រសិនបើអញ្ចឹងមែន ធ្វើទៅ» លោកផានិត បន្ថែម។ «ប៉ុន្តែត្រូវហ៊ានចំណាយ ២៨០លានដុល្លារ ដើម្បីទូទាត់»។

តស៊ូដើម្បីវីរៈជ័យ

លុយមិនអាចធ្វើអ្វីៗបានគ្រប់យ៉ាងនោះទេ។

ប្រជាសហគមន៍ការពារធម្មជាតិ​ចំនួន ៤៧នាក់ ​ត្រូវ​បាន​ចាត់​ឲ្យ​ទៅ​វីរៈជ័យ ដែល​មាន​ន័យ​ថា​ 

រាល់៧០គីឡូម៉ែត្រការ៉េ មានអ្នកឆ្មាំម្នាក់។ ពួកគាត់ភាគច្រើនមកពីសហគមន៍ជនជាតិដើមភាគតិច ដែលចាត់ទុកតំបន់ការពាររបស់ពួកគាត់ ដូចទៅនឹងផ្ទះយ៉ាងអញ្ចឹង ហើយការល្បាតមួយលើកៗ ចាយពេលកន្លះខែ។

សម្រាប់ពួកគាត់ វីរៈជ័យគឺមានសារៈសំខាន់ជាងការស្រូប និងរក្សាកាបូន និងប្រភពថាមពលទៅទៀត។

នៅឧទ្យានឯណេះវិញ ប្រជាសហគមន៍ការពារធម្មជាតិជាជនជាតិដើមភាគតិច កំពុងសើច ខណៈដែលពួកគាត់ប្រាប់ខ្ញុំកុំឱ្យសម្លាប់សត្វទាក ដែលកំពុងជញ្ជក់ឈាមលើដៃ ជើង ក និងត្រចៀកខាងស្តាំរបស់ខ្ញុំ។

ពួកគាត់​ហៅ​វា​ថា​ជា​​ «​ពន្ធ​ព្រៃឈើ​» មានន័យថាសត្វនេះជាអំណោយរបស់ព្រៃ រាល់ពេលមានមាន់ថ្មីចូល។ ជាជាងសម្លាប់ពួកវា ពួកគាត់បានជក់បារីបង្ហុយ ដើម្បីការពារពីសត្វទាក ខណៈពេលដែលខ្ញុំបកវាចេញយ៉ាងវេទនា និងយ៉ាងប្រុងប្រយ័ត្នទៅតាមដែលខ្ញុំអាចធ្វើបាន។

ប្រជាសហគមន៍ការពារធម្មជាតិមួយចំនួន ព្រម​ទាំង​មន្ត្រីឧទ្យានុរក្សនៃ​ក្រសួង​បរិស្ថាន គឺជា​ជនជាតិ​ភាគតិចព្រៅ ដែល​មាន​កម្លាំង​ប្រមាណ ៦០,០០០នាក់ មក​ពី​ប្រទេស​កម្ពុជា ឡាវ និង​វៀតណាម។

ជាបង្គោលព្រំដែនដែលខណ្ឌចែកប្រទេសទាំងបី​  វីរៈជ័យ​ជា​បេះដូង​​របស់សហគមន៍​ជនជាតិ​ដើម។

នៅពេលដែលការល្បាតរបស់យើងបានបញ្ចប់ នៅតំបន់ភ្នំវាលធំមានខ្យល់បក់រំភើយៗ អមដោយសូរិយាអស្តង្គត ដែលប្រែក្លាយផ្ទៃមេឃទាំងមូលទៅជាមាស។

លោក ស្រា អឺ ដែលជាជនជាតិភាគតិចព្រៅ និងជាប្រធានស្នាក់ការរដ្ឋបាលព្រៃឈើតាវែង ណែនាំខ្ញុំឱ្យកំណត់ម៉ោងរោទិ៍របស់ខ្ញុំនៅម៉ោង ២ រំលងអធ្រាត្រ ដើម្បីមើលផ្កាយ។

ពេលដល់​ម៉ោង​២​រំលង​អធ្រាត្រ លោក អឺ ខ្មាស​ខ្ញុំយ៉ាងខ្លាំង។

ដោយសារតែយប់នោះ តារារាប់លាងដួងត្រូវបាំងជិតដោយពពក និងរស្មីដួងច័ន្ទ។ ដើម្បីកុំឱ្យខ្ញុំខកចិត្ត លោក អឺ មួលគម្របកានដាក់ស្រាអង្ករ ដែលជាស្រាដ៏ពិបាកលេប។

នៅក្រោមពន្លឺពណ៌ក្រហមនៃចង្កៀងពាក់ជាប់ក្បាលរបស់ខ្ញុំ និងទោរទន់ទៅតាមឥទ្ធិពលនៃស្រារបស់គាត់ លោក អឺ ប្រាប់ខ្ញុំអំពីទំនាក់ទំនងរបស់ប្រជាជនព្រៅទៅនឹងទឹកដីនេះ ដែលគាត់បានរៀបរាប់ថា វាជាហេតុផលដែលគាត់ធ្វើឱ្យគាត់ក្លាយទៅជាឆ្មាំព្រៃ។

«ពួកយើងខ្វល់ខ្វាយអំពីវីរៈជ័យ ហើយពួកយើងការពារឧទ្យាននេះទៅតាមលទ្ធភាពរបស់ពួកយើង» គាត់បានប្រាប់។

អត្ថបទនេះត្រូវបានផលិត ដោយការចូលរួមរវាង The Japan Times និង Southeast Asia Globe ដោយមានការជ្រោមជ្រែងពី បណ្តាញស៊ើបអង្កេតព្រៃទឹកភ្លៀង នៃ មជ្ឈមណ្ឌល Pulitzer

The post ការអភិវឌ្ឍ «ចរីភាព» ៖ កម្ពុជាប្រឈមនឹងការបាត់បង់ជីវចម្រុះនៅឯព្រំដែន appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

As it turned out, apart from its benefits for well-being, Dalat was a great place to grow things that didn’t do well at sea level. Vegetables and fruits like avocados, artichokes and strawberries thrived in the cooler climate. So, too, did flowers: orchids, roses, hydrangeas. Coffee farms and cashew orchards proliferated on the steep-sided mountain slopes.

Much to the gall of the Gauls, however, grapes didn’t do as well. French being French, they loved their wine, and they had high hopes that the upland climate might yield something akin to the Vitis vinifera of their European homeland: A merlot, perhaps. A robust cabernet. A crisp sauvignon blanc.

Through many fits and starts, they finally have it, although the French colonists are long gone.

Today the Ladora Winery, operated by Ladofoods, is firmly established in greater Dalat. Its wines may not be to the taste of many Westerners, but as wineries go, it is the “only one with a proper vineyard and winemaking”, affirmed Tu Lê Huy, president and co-founder of the Saigon Sommelier Association. Indeed, Ladora is the only start-to-finish winery anywhere in the former French Indochina.

Ladora grows its own grapes and processes its own wines. The grapes — cabernet sauvignon, shiraz, merlot and sauvignon blanc, plus the hybrid Cardinal varietal — are grown in 125 hectares of vineyards near Phan Rang, not far from ancient Champa Empire ruins. Immediately upon their twice-yearly harvest, they are trucked 60 kilometers to the Ladofoods factory to be de-stemmed, crushed, fermented, pressed, filtered, aged and bottled.

The French had found the local grapes to be far too tart for wine. Even with vineyard cuttings from Europe, the heat and humidity produced only low yields of bitter berries. So they turned their attention to making sweeter fruit wines, especially apple and strawberry. The Vietnamese already knew that tropical fruits, including bananas and pineapples, could be fermented to produce a high-proof if barely palatable household plonk.

Upon the normalisation of diplomatic relations with the West in the 1990s, wine grapes made a reappearance in Vietnam, boosted by Australian and European investment and modern technology. The key to success was planting in a different climate zone than the production facility.

“Dalat is too rainy, too fertile for grapes,” said Huy, one of three Vietnamese men who founded the sommeliers’ group in 2017. It has now grown to 120 members. “Dalat is great for tea and coffee, but not good for grapes. That’s why Lado grows its grapes in Ninh Thuan province.”

Wine in Asia

Elsewhere in Vietnam, Hanoi’s MAM Distillery, established in 2019, blends rice wine with fermented fruit juices, 15 in all, kumquats to raspberries to lemons. Sơn Tinh, founded in Hanoi by a Swiss winemaker in 2000, makes a small-batch rice wine noted for its herbal qualities.

The DalatBeco wine company, launched in 2007, has been importing fruit from France to counter struggles with the quality and consistency of grapes produced by local growers, despite a joint-venture partnership with wine experts in Avignon.

“A lot of bulk wine importers bottle their own wine here,” Huy noted.

The nearest full wineries to southern Vietnam are 1,000 km from Dalat, in Thailand’s Khao Yai hills northeast of Bangkok. Cambodia has a fruit winery in Battambang province. Other Asian countries are slowly progressing.

One of their champions is American wine educator and author Liz Thach, a certified Master of Wine and a professor at California’s Sonoma State University.

“I am pleased to see the growth of wineries in Asia, along with consumer interest in wine,” Thach said. “China actually has a very old wine culture and over 400 wineries, with some of them producing excellent award-winning wines. Bali now has four wineries, and I recently visited one of them and was extremely impressed with the quality of the wine.

“Vietnam has also been producing wine for many years, and they have become very creative in pairing wine with the delicious Vietnamese cuisine. Wineries are growing in number in Thailand, Japan, Korea and India. I believe there is an exciting future for wine in Asia.”

Huy was less enthusiastic about Chinese wine than Japanese.

“China is still very much in the early stage of winemaking,” he said. “I tried some; it still has a lot of tannin and lacks character. But Japan makes some nice whites, which they’ve crossed with native grapes suitable to the climate.”

Profit and projection

From a profitability standpoint, wine is far from big business in Vietnam. Consumption of imported wines far exceeds domestic brands, yet in 2023, the market yielded only $229 million, about $2.30 per capita. By contrast, U.S. wine revenue was over $56 billion, with per capita consumption of about $58. Continued growth in the Vietnam wine market is anticipated at a rate of just under 4% per year through 2027.

Figures from Ladofoods highlight the fallout the domestic industry experienced in 2022 as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Vietnam’s leading wine producer netted $10.15 million in sales in 2021, yet that figure plummeted to $7.85 million in 2022. It’s likely that 2023 will show a recovery to more than $9.2 million, or 223 billion Vietnam dong.

About 40% of Ladora’s production is exported to other Asian countries, said tasting-room manager Ngoc Dung. Of that, Japan gets the lion’s share, followed by Korea. Lesser amounts are shipped to Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, Laos, China and Taiwan. That leaves 60% for the domestic market.

“The Vietnam market is definitely an entry-level market,” said Huy. “They are only starting to get the idea of wine pairing. There’s a niche market of well-educated and really wealthy Vietnamese for whom classic Bordeauxs are number one.

“They’ve started to drink white with seafood. But for the most part, white wine is not working well here. It’s better in the north because North Vietnamese have a different palate. They like more acidity but not sweet. Central Vietnam likes more spice. The South likes sugar.”

A visit to Ladora

The Ladora Winery is located 28 kilometers east of Dalat city in the hill country of the Phat Chi district. The elegant Chateau Dalat, sitting atop a garden knoll, is at the heart of a building complex overlooking a landscape of greenhouses that provide colourful flowers to the markets of Dalat and Ho Chi Minh City.

Twenty-five steps beneath an earth-covered hummock is an elaborate and extensive wine cellar. Oak barrels filled with aging cabernet sauvignon, shiraz and merlot, and stainless-steel drums of sauvignon blanc, are stacked against the walls. A tower of unlabeled bottles of reds occupies the middle of one room. A long tasting table awaits tour groups, not present on this day.

Assistant winemaker Nguyen Lan said the company makes two principal kinds of wine with these same grapes, for two distinct markets. The Chateau Dalat brand is designed for those of European predilection; wines are plus or minus 12% alcohol. Vang Dalat, its grapes blended with the hybrid Cardinal varietal, is typically over 15%. Ladoro also makes a sweet but lower-alcohol Nouvo Sangria and a sparkling Vivazz fruit wine.

“Mostly, Asians like the sweeter wines,” Lan said. “So we add mulberries, whose sugar increases the alcohol content while making the colour a bit lighter.”

“In Dalat, there’s just not enough sugar in the natural wine,” sommelier Huy reiterated. “The mulberry adds more sugar and more colour.”

Europeans, by contrast, prefer the unblended Chateau Dalat varietals, made under the direction of head winemaker Lê Binh together with European consultants. Some of these have been honoured at wine competitions in Hong Kong and San Francisco.

A sample tasting

A visit to Ladora’s sophisticated, Czech-designed tasting room begins with a video presentation introducing the Ninh Thuan vineyards. The company owns one-fifth of the grapes here; the remaining 100 hectares belong to private farmers contracted to sell the grapes to Ladora. Drip irrigation ensures the plants have sufficient water in the dry season. Flocks of ducks patrol the wine hedges to eat insect pests.

Annual grape production averages 10 to 15 tonnes per hectare, Lan said. All of the fruit is transported uphill to the modern Central Highlands factory, where the temperature is maintained at a steady 18 to 20 degrees Celsius.

It would be impossible to taste each one of the more than two dozen wines in the Ladofoods catalogue in a single sitting. A sample tasting is more instructional than comprehensive. The 2017 Chateau Dalat Special sauvignon blanc is very dry, a little sour, with aromas of lime and passion fruit. It’s recommended to be enjoyed with shellfish.

The Vang Dalat Classic Special is a 70-30 blend of Cardinal grapes with mulberries. Despite high acidity and peppery spice, it has a mellow finish. “It’s my favorite,” said the assistant winemaker. Vang Dalat Strong, at 15% alcohol, is an 85-15 blend of Cardinal and mulberries with a lighter ruby colour and the aroma of sweet berries, almost like jam on bread. “Korean guests love this one,” Lan said. Because of their mulberry content, the Vang Dalat wines don’t carry a vintage date.

More traditional in approach is the 2018 Chateau Dalat Reserve cabernet sauvignon, aged in French-made American oak barrels for 1½ years. A subtle flavour of black currant presides over a gentle red that retails at $14. Aged six months longer, the 2019 Chateau Dalat Signature shiraz is earthy and full-bodied with rich tannins and a white-pepper finish.

Its retail price is $34. “Japanese and Koreans love this one,” said Lan.

“Most people in Vietnam have the idea that import wine is better than wine from Vietnam,” the assistant winemaker said. “So it’s hard to change their mind.”

Of course, not all Vietnamese are enamoured with their country’s domestically produced wines. Lê Huy, the sommelier, suggested that they lack originality: “Welcome to the government company,” he laughed. Formerly state-owned, Ladofoods is now a Vietnamese joint stock corporation.

Looking ahead

Today, as a picturesque city of nearly half a million people, Da Lat is a favorite of tourists both domestic and international. It remains a health resort as well as a center for education, its universities famed for their work in biotechnology, nuclear physics and architecture. Beautiful gardens surround its urban lakes. A street market is renowned throughout Vietnam.

But there are no winery tasting rooms even though there is apparently no prohibition against them. Dalat wines are widely available in shops in that city, and in Ladofoods’ showroom in Ho Chi Minh City, but consumers have no chance to taste the wines before buying them. It seems that someone is missing a great great marketing opportunity.

Foreign investors have looked into the possibility of establishing other wine regions in Vietnam. But Huy said it’s unlikely that will happen.

“In the North, we don’t have a delta big enough for vineyards,” he said. “It’s only rocks.

“The Bana Hills near Danang are very suited for wine grapes, but the best climate is in the middle of a national reserve — and money cannot talk in the national reserve. There was interest from an Italian winemaker, but the wine would have had to be priced at $70 a bottle. There would be no way to sell it.”

The post A passion for wine in Vietnam’s Central Highlands appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

Driven by Chinese government crackdowns from the casino enclave of Macau, some organisers of VIP gambling tours – known as junkets – appear to be enduring the storm while also transferring business elsewhere in their regional networks. Meanwhile, in Vietnam, locally owned gambling operators are restyling themselves to snap up Chinese whales of their own, potentially cutting deeper into the besieged junkets.

The legal pressure in Macau sought to cut down on money laundering and capital flight, both of which are often suspected of jet-setting Chinese gamblers. 

Junket operators in the enclave developed a reputation for helping the affluent ferry their money across the border of the special administrative district to gamble in casinos. There, they could obtain their winnings in U.S. dollars or other foreign currencies that could then be used to invest in property or offshore tax havens. 

But with the effects of the pandemic on this clientele still reverberating across the region’s casinos, unfavourable foreign currency exchange fees and slippery Macau junkets refusing to die, the prospect of Vietnam or other regional destinations becoming hubs for such exiled gamers is up in the air. Gambling operators both in Macau and across Southeast Asia are left to adapt to secure their piece of the market. 

“I think that there’s going to be new intermediaries which won’t call themselves junkets, but in effect, are going to be providing the sorts of services that junket operators used in the past,” said John Langdale, a researcher and expert on money laundering at Australia’s Macquarie University. 

Vietnam is already a node of the bustling Chinese gambling tour business that re-emerged after the pandemic. As junkets in Macau get pushed further underground, preexisting Vietnamese gaming firms, known as “international tour operators” seem eager to fill a gap. 

For now though, their organisations have a more limited reach than the Macau giants that came before them. In general, Southeast Asian junkets “tend to be what we call ad-hoc casual junkets,” said gaming industry consultant Ben Lee. 

That stands in contrast to what former junket operators in Macau utilised as an almost vertical integration model, where gambling tour operators had junket rooms in various casinos. There, they could staff their own cashiers, food and beverage services, and even drivers due to their enormous market share of affluent Chinese gamblers, Lee explained.

Southeast Asian junket operators – at the moment – simply do not have the ability to target the Chinese as they do not have the network in the country. Their main markets are the various Southeast Asia countries with nowhere near the size or volume of Chinese players, Lee said. 

Only a few regional facilities right now may have the clout to break through.

The Hoiana, a multi-billion-dollar integrated resort-casino, could be one of them. It stretches across 1,000 hectares of land in the Chu Lai Open Economic Zone south of Da Nang, Vietnam.

“The Hoiana is probably one of the first proper five-star resorts that has a chance to target [the Chinese market],” Lee said. “But, by the end of day, the volume of mainland patronage in Vietnam is small compared with China.”

The casino-resort didn’t respond to a request for comment, but Hoiana president and CEO Steve Wolstenholme said in an interview earlier this year that following the pandemic and a return of Chinese tourists, the Hoiana was focused on “diversifying our products and services, especially services for high-class guests”.

In recent months, control of the Hoiana seems to have passed hands from LET Group Holdings – previously known as the Suncity Group, one of Macau’s largest junket organisers pre-crackdown – to the billionaire Cheng family from Hong Kong through its flagship investment firm, Chow Tai Fook Enterprises. 

The family and Suncity were already deeply connected before the now-embattled tour operator was all but crushed by law-enforcement agencies in Macau. 

As a gambling investor in casino-dense Macau, now-deceased family patriarch Cheng Yu Tung allegedly partnered with triad organisations such as 14K and Sun Yee On as early as the 1980s. Macau prosecutors would later say he was in business with the notorious 14K leader Wan Kuok Koi – better known as “Broken Tooth” Koi – before the gangster met with a dramatic 1998 arrest.

The Cheng family later partnered with a man reportedly seen as Koi’s protege – Alvin Chau, founder and CEO of the once-powerful Suncity tour company. After starting his company in 2007, Chau built a fortune with Chinese VIP gamblers and, later, real-estate development. But his success put him under the thumb of the Chinese junket crackdown and he was arrested in 2021, effectively cratering that industry.

Last year, Suncity officially rebranded itself as the LET Group while Chau awaited trial in Macau for 286 criminal charges, including fraud and money laundering. By January, Chau was convicted of heading a criminal organisation and sentenced to 18 years in prison.

Suncity had publicly led development of Hoiana and held a major ownership stake in the project, which reportedly struggled in recent years. 

The recently publicised change in management coincides with the shutdown of Suncity’s VIP rooms in Macau following Chau’s jailing. It also follows upon the regulatory tightening of Macau junket operators documented as having associations with organised crime and money laundering – or simply suspected of such.

Jeremy Douglas, regional representative of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, fears that in the months and years ahead, the Hoiana could prove to be a model for still-ambitious junket bosses and Chinese gamblers eager to launder their money.

Vietnam currently has no specific licensing regimes for operators of gambling-related tours. Still, the Hoiana has kept much cleaner operations than the many more notorious casinos littered across the region’s special economic zones.

Regional casinos located in these special economic zones (SEZs) are often known to deploy a model whereby casinos become money-laundering fronts for displaced Chinese and regional syndicates. In addition, they may harbour other illicit activities such as cyber scams, human trafficking, drug trafficking and the wildlife trade. 

Some zones, such as the notorious “Golden Triangle” SEZ in Laos, become self-policed areas for syndicate bosses migrating from China. The Golden Triangle SEZ is organised under the Kings Romans Group, owned and operated by the U.S.-sanctioned syndicate chief Zhao Wei. 

Other SEZs are clustered along Mekong region borders and closely overlap with casinos. 

More than 100 casinos in Myanmar are nestled among 13 such zones, according to maps and data provided by the UNODC, while Vietnam has an estimated 41 casinos in or near 44 SEZs.

The diversification into entertainment and conventions and all the rest of it, they provide the cover and the legitimacy for the casinos

John Langdale

The prospect of lawlessness in these zones has caught the attention of authorities, contributing to China’s tightened control over outbound visas. With that, Macau has remained the ideal gambling destination due to its proximity and limited autonomous status.

The former Portuguese colony – despite the supposed shutdown of junket operations in the zone – has developed an underground model that is giving just enough space for high-rolling Chinese gamblers on the hunt for capital flight destinations and elaborate gambling tours.

“What most people don’t know is that the (junket) agents are still operating in Macau, but they’re no longer being identified as junkets because that’s no longer politically correct,” said Lee. “They are now being recognized by the casinos as players.”

As “programme players”, junket operators are able to allocate a private VIP room in a casino with a large enough buy-in. The junket agents are then able to organise a private gaming setting for their “friends” in which only the agent deals with the casino directly. The agent will then redistribute the buy-in chips to their friends, who are actually their clientele, Lee explained. 

“They don’t make any money, but they’re doing that to keep the relationship with their players warm, waiting for the day when they and their players can start going to the casinos around the region,” he said.

In the meantime, operators in Vietnam appear to be looking to team up with Macau’s veteran casino concessionaires.  

The tour operator Let’s Win Group, which had its soft-opening at the Hoiana in February 2022, held a grand opening ceremony and gala dinner for its VIP club in March of this year – and flaunted an invitation to six of Macau’s casino concessionaires. 

Still, as Vietnam shows benevolence to foreign investment from the moguls of the gambling-tour industry, the country heavily restricts lending money to foreigners. This results, among other things, in a bureaucratic bump in the road for the junket-diaspora to the country. 

According to Langdale, the Hoiana also resembles the trendy “integrated resort” model – such as Singapore’s Sentosa Island – that has been established in the gaming industry as a guise to revamp an outdated Macau junket model. In the case of Singapore, where junkets are illegal, it disguises the fact that the real money is coming from high rollers. 

“[Instead of] smoky casinos with Chinese gamblers – gambling 24 hours a day – they’ll present a nice, healthy family-oriented resort,” he said.

The integrated resort model stresses an atmosphere of a holiday destination with family entertainment, and incentivizes hosting conventions. The Hoiana advertises itself only as a resort and golf destination “but you’re still getting VIP gamblers,” said Langdale.

“The diversification into entertainment and conventions and all the rest of it, they provide the cover and the legitimacy for the casinos,” he added. “By going down as the integrated resort, the casino operator can say we’re no longer relying on hardcore gamblers.”

As Thailand begins to relax visa rules for Chinese tourists, Langdale suspects that Vietnam will follow a similar shift. This could attract affluent Chinese tourists and investors seeking a landing zone for capital flight.

“And the Hoiana is one mechanism for doing that,” he said.

The post After junket crackdown in Macau, SEA casinos target Chinese gamblers appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

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ខេត្តឧត្តរមានជ័យ

នៅខេត្តឧត្តរមានជ័យ រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម ហាន សេង ដែលអាចផលិតថាមពលបាន ២៦៥មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ ជាគម្រោងសម្រេចបានពាក់កណ្តាល បានហួសថ្ងៃកំណត់ការបិទបញ្ចប់ការសងសង់ តាំងពីឆ្នាំមុនមកម្លេះ។ ដោយសារតែជំនួយធ្លាក់ចុះ ម្ចាស់គម្រោងបានបង្វែរគម្រោងនេះ ឱ្យទៅក្រុមហ៊ុនម៉ៅការសាងសង់ថ្មីវិញ ដែលមិនត្រឹមតែបន្តការផលិតអគ្គីសនីដោយធ្យូងថ្មប៉ុណ្ណោះទេ ប៉ុន្តែក៏សម្លឹងឃើញ នូវការវិនិយោគបន្ថែម លើថាមពលសូឡានៅទីតាំងនេះផងដែរ។

«​ខ្ញុំ​ចង់​ឲ្យ​អ្នក​រាល់​គ្នា​ក្នុង​សហគមន៍​របស់​ខ្ញុំមានអគ្គិសនីប្រើប្រាស់ ប៉ុន្តែ​ខ្ញុំ​ក៏​មាន​ការ​ព្រួយ​បារម្ភ ​អំពី​ហានិភ័យ​សុខភាព​ដល់​កម្មករ និង​ប្រជាជន​ក្នុង​មូលដ្ឋាន​ផង​ដែរ»។ រូបភាព៖ Anton L. Delgado ផ្តល់ឱ្យ Southeast Asia Globe

ច្រេក ពេជ្យនេង

ខេត្ត​កោះ កុង​

នៅ​ខេត្ត​កោះកុង ក្រុមហ៊ុន​រ៉ូយ៉ាល់​គ្រុប​កម្ពុជា ​នៅ​មិន​ទាន់​បាន​បញ្ចប់​ការ​សាងសង់​រោងចក្រ​ថាមពល​អគ្គិសនី ៧០០ មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ ​ដែល​គ្រោង​នឹង​ដំណើរការ​នៅ​ឆ្នាំ​នេះនៅឡើយ។ ទោះ​បី​ជាយ៉ាងណា ​អ្នក​ស្រុកដែលនៅតំបន់នោះពីមុន​ នៅ​តែ​បន្ត​តវ៉ាទៅលើសំណងមិនសមរម្យ ភាពអយុត្តិធម៌ និង​ការ​បង្រ្កាបមកលើប្រជាជន នាពេលពួកគាត់ត្រូវបានគេបណ្ដេញចេញ។

ខេត្ត ព្រះសីហនុ

នៅខេត្តព្រះសីហនុ គម្រោងសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មថាមពល ៧០០មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ របស់ក្រុមហ៊ុន Cambodia International Investment Development Group (CIIDG) មានទីតាំងស្ថិតនៅតាមបណ្តោយផ្លូវជាតិតែមួយ ជាមួយនឹងរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីថាមពល ២៥០មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ របស់ Cambodian Energy Limited (CEL) ដែលកំពុងដំណើរការស្របពេលគ្នា។ ប្រជាពលរដ្ឋរស់នៅស្រុកស្ទឹងហាវ ក៏បានបង្ហាញអំពីកង្វល់របស់ពួកគាត់ ជុំវិញនឹងផលប៉ះពាល់សុខភាព និងបរិស្ថាន ដែលបង្កឡើង ដោយរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មផងដែរ។

រាយការណ៍បន្ថែមដោយ៖ Andrew Haffner និង ឡាយ សុផាន់ណា

អត្ថបទនេះទទួលបានការគាំទ្រពីជំនួយ News Reporting Pitch Initiative ពីមូលនិធិខុនរ៉ាតអាឌិនណៅអ៊ែរ​ Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung ប្រចាំកម្ពុជា

The post ការពឹងផ្អែកលើថាមពលធ្យូងថ្មរបស់កម្ពុជា៖  បីឆ្នាំក្រោយការប្រើប្រាស់ទ្វេរដងលើផូស៊ីលឥន្ធនះ appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

After companies and embassies expressed concerns about coal, the Cambodian government pledged that its plans to develop three new coal-fired power plants would be the Kingdom’s last foray into coal-fuelled electricity.

Since 2020, energy production globally has continued to diversify away from coal, as volatile markets rock the industry and spike fuel prices. Despite surviving China’s funding cuts to overseas coal, the planned power plants in Koh Kong and Oddar Meanchey are in varying stages of inertia, plagued by long delays. Meanwhile in Sihanoukville, the operations of two of Cambodia’s active coal complexes in the same district are raising concerns among local residents.

Southeast Asia Globe reported from each of these locations. While taking more than 4,300 images, Globe spoke to 35 people about the projects; from concerned residents and struggling fisherfolk to plant workers, local officials and energy experts. Read Part I of Globe’s Counting on Coal project and continue to see Part II, an accompanying photo story. Click or tap any image to expand for a slideshow.

Oddar Meanchey province

In Oddar Meanchey, the 265-megawatt, semi-built Han Seng project missed its deadline to go online last year. Falling revenue for the Chinese companies in charge pivoted the project to new contractors, who are sticking with coal but also investing in solar energy production at the same power plant.

“I want electricity to be accessible to everyone in my community, but I am also concerned about the health risks to workers and local people,” she said. Photo by Anton L. Delgado for Southeast Asia Globe.

Chrek Pechneng

Koh Kong province

In Koh Kong, the Royal Group of Cambodia conglomerate has yet to break ground on a 700-megawatt power plant scheduled to go online this year. Though former residents continue to allege unfair deals and heavy-handed evictions.

Sihanoukville province

In Sihanoukville, Cambodia International Investment Development Group’s (CIIDG) new 700-megawatt coal project shares a road with the already operational 250-megawatt Cambodian Energy Limited (CEL) power plant complex. Steung Hav residents fear for the effects these two coal sites could have on their health and environment.

Contributed reporting by Andrew Haffner and Sophanna Lay. A Khmer-language version of this story can be found here, with translations by Sophanna Lay and Nasa Dip.

This article was supported by a ‘News Reporting Pitch Initiative’ from the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Foundation in Cambodia.

The post Counting on coal: A visual guide to Cambodia’s big bet on fossil fuel appeared first on Southeast Asia Globe.

សំណង់រោងក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម ដែលស្ថិតនៅលើដីវាលមួយកន្លែងនៅក្នុងខេត្តឧត្តរមានជ័យ ត្រូវបានផ្អាកសកម្មភាពសាងសង់។ ឥដ្ឋស៊ីម៉ង់ដ៍ដែលមានវល្លិ៍តោង ព្រមទាំងម៉ាស៉ីនលាយបេតុង និងសំបកកង់ឡានដែលទុកចោល ហាក់ដូចជាតម្រុយបញ្ជាក់អំពីការផ្អាកសាងសង់។

សន្តិសុខយាមដែលកំពុងជួបជុំគ្នានៅពេលល្ងាចនៅមុខខ្លោងទ្វាររោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី បានត្អូញត្អែរអំពីការពន្យារពេលបើកប្រាក់ខែ អស់រយៈពេល៤ខែ និងបានបញ្ជាក់ ពួកគាត់មិនដឹងថារោងចក្រ នឹងបន្តសាងសង់នៅថ្ងៃណាទេ។

អនាគតនៃរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម ហាន សេង ហាក់ឆ្លុះបញ្ចាំងអំពីគម្រោងផលិតកម្មអគ្គីសនីស្រដៀងគ្នា នៅអាស៊ីអាគ្នេយ៍ផ្សេងៗ ដែលទទួលបានការគាំទ្រពីចិន និងជាផ្នែកមួយ នៃយុទ្ធសាស្ត្រអភិវឌ្ឍហេដ្ឋារចនាសម្ព័ន្ធ នៃកិច្ចផ្តួចផ្តើមផ្តើមខ្សែក្រវ៉ាត់មួយ ផ្លូវមួយ។

កាលពីឆ្នាំ ២០២០ ប្រទេសកម្ពុជាហាក់ដូចជាមិនខ្វាយខ្វល់ ទៅនឹងការជំរុញឱ្យប្រើប្រាស់ថាមពលស្អាតជាសាកល ដោយបន្តការប្រើប្រាស់ទ្វេដងលើផូស៊ីលឥន្ធនះ ជាមួយនឹងគោលបំណងពង្រីក និងអភិវឌ្ឍរោងចក្រថាមពលធ្យូងថ្មចំនួនបី។ ផែនការបង្កើនថាមពល​នេះ ​បែរជាមិន​ត្រូវ​បាន​គេ​យក​ចិត្ត​ទុក​ដាក់ ដោយនៅ​ឆ្នាំ​បន្ទាប់​ប្រទេស​ចិន​បង្ហាញគោលជំហរ ក្នុង​ការ​កាត់​បន្ថយ​ការ​គាំទ្រ​រោងចក្រ​ធ្យូង​ថ្ម​នៅ​បរទេស ដែល​បាន​សម្លាប់​គម្រោង​នៅ​កន្លែង​ផ្សេង​ទៀត ​ក្នុង​តំបន់​អាស៊ីអាគ្នេយ៍។

ថ្វីត្បិតតែកម្ពុជាទទួលរងនូវថ្មបាក់ពីជំហរថ្មីរបស់ចិន រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី ដែលស្ថិតក្នុងដំណាក់កាលខុសៗគ្នានេះ ជាគម្រោងដែលរាជរដ្ឋាភិបាលកម្ពុជា បានកំណត់ថា ជារោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីថាមពលធ្យូងថ្មចុងក្រោយ។ ក្រុមការងារ Southeast Asia Globe បានរកឃើញថា មានគម្រោងបីដែលគេនឹងធ្វើនៅខេត្តចំនួនបី ក៏ដូចជារោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម ដែលមានស្រាប់ផងដែរ។

នៅខេត្តកោះកុងឯណោះវិញ ក្រុមហ៊ុន Royal Group មានគម្រោងសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី (តែមិនទាន់មានសកម្មភាព) ៧០០មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ ក្នុងឆ្នាំនេះ បើទោះបីជាប្រជាពលរដ្ឋសម្តែងការមិនពេញចិត្ត ទៅនឹងសំណងមិនសមរម្យ និងការបង្ក្រាបមកលើប្រជាពលរដ្ឋពីសំណាក់អាជ្ញាធរក៏ដោយ។  

នៅខេត្តឧត្តរមានជ័យ រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី ហាន សេង ដែលអាចផលិតថាមពលបាន ២៦៥មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ ជាគម្រោងសម្រេចបានពាក់កណ្តាល បានហួសថ្ងៃកំណត់ការបិទបញ្ចប់ការសងសង់ តាំងពីឆ្នាំមុន។ ដោយសារតែជំនួយធ្លាក់ចុះ ម្ចាស់គម្រោងបានបង្វែរគម្រោងនេះ ឱ្យទៅក្រុមហ៊ុនម៉ៅការសាងសង់ថ្មីវិញ ដែលមិនត្រឹមតែបន្តចាប់យក ការផលិតអគ្គីសនីដោយធ្យូងថ្មប៉ុណ្ណោះទេ ប៉ុន្តែក្រុមហ៊ុនថ្មីនេះក៏សម្លឹងឃើញ នូវការវិនិយោគបន្ថែមលើថាមពលសូឡានៅទីតាំងនេះផងដែរ។

នៅខេត្តព្រះសីហនុ គម្រោងសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី ថាមពល ៧០០មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ របស់ក្រុមហ៊ុន Cambodia International Investment Development Group (CIIDG) ស្ថិតនៅតាមបណ្តោយផ្លូវជាតិតែមួយ ជាមួយនឹងរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី Cambodian Energy Limited (CEL) ដែលកំពុងដំណើរការស្របពេលគ្នា។ ប្រជាពលរដ្ឋរស់នៅស្រុកស្ទឹងហាវ ក៏បានបង្ហាញអំពីកង្វល់របស់ពួកគាត់ជុំវិញនឹងផលប៉ះពាល់សុខភាព និងផលប៉ះពាល់ដល់បរិស្ថាន ដែលបង្កឡើងដោយរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មផងដែរ។

លោក ហង្ស ដារ៉ា បានលាឈប់ពីការងារជាជាងភ្លើងនៅរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម CEL ហើយសព្វថ្ងៃជាអ្នកនេសាទ បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «វាមិនល្អសម្រាប់សុខភាពរបស់យើងទេ។ បញ្ហានេះនឹងប៉ះពាល់ដល់ក្មេងជំនាន់ក្រោយ ដោយសារតែនៅខេត្តឥលូវ មានរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មច្រើន»។  

អនាគតផូស៊ីលឥន្ធនះ

កាលពីឆ្នាំ ២០២១ កន្លងទៅ នៅពេល កំពុងថ្លែងនៅមហាសន្និបាតអង្គការសហប្រជាជាតិ លោកប្រធានាធិបតីចិន ស៊ី ជីនពីង បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា ដើម្បីបន្ត «ការប្តេជ្ញារស់នៅប្រកបដោយសុខដុមរមនារវាងមនុស្ស និងធម្មជាតិ» លោក ស៊ី ជីនពីង នឹងបង្កើនការគាំទ្ររបស់ខ្លួន ដើម្បីអភិវឌ្ឍនូវថាមពលបៃតង និងការបញ្ចេញឧស្ម័នកាបូនតិចតួច ហើយថែមទាំង «មិនបន្តសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីដើរដោយការដុតធ្យូងថ្ម នៅក្រៅប្រទេសទៀតទេ»។ 

ក្នុងនាមជាអ្នកផ្តល់ហិរញ្ញប្បទាន និងជាអ្នកផ្គត់ផ្គង់ដ៏សំខាន់ដល់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម សេចក្តីប្រកាសរបស់ប្រទេសចិន ត្រូវបានសាទរថាជាជំហានដ៏សំខាន់ ឆ្ពោះទៅរកការសម្រេចបាននូវគោលដៅនៃកិច្ចព្រមព្រៀងទីក្រុងប៉ារីស ឈ្ពោះទៅការកាត់បន្ថយការកើនឡើងសីតុណ្ហភាពពិភពលោក ដោយកាត់បន្ថយការបំភាយឧស្ម័នផ្ទះកញ្ចក់។

យោងតាមមជ្ឈមណ្ឌលស្រាវជ្រាវថាមពល និងខ្យល់ស្អាត ឬ Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) បានឱ្យដឹងថា ជោគវាសនានៃគម្រោងធ្យូងថ្មដែលគាំទ្រដោយចិនចំនួន ៧៧កន្លែង នៅជុំវិញពិភពលោក ដែលស្ថិតក្នុងដំណាក់កាលផ្សេងៗគ្នានៃការអភិវឌ្ឍ មកដល់ពេលនេះ នៅតែមិនប្រាកដថា នឹងបន្តទទួលបានការគាំទ្រពីចិន ឬក៏យ៉ាងណានោះទេ។

ស្ទើរតែពាក់កណ្តាលនៃរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីទាំងនេះ ត្រូវបានគេសាងសង់ឡើងនៅអាស៊ីអាគ្នេយ៍។

ប្រសិនបើគម្រោងទាំង ៣៧ នៅក្នុងប្រទេសឥណ្ឌូនេស៊ី វៀតណាម ឡាវ កម្ពុជា និងហ្វីលីពីន ត្រូវបានដំណើរការទៅតាមអាយុកាលស្តង់ដាររបស់ពួកគេពី ២៥ ទៅ ៣០ឆ្នាំនោះ មជ្ឈមណ្ឌល CREA បានគណនាថា កាបូនច្រើនជាង ៥,៥០០ លានតោន នឹងត្រូវបានបញ្ចេញទៅក្នុងបរិយាកាស។

រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មទាំងបីនៅក្នុងប្រទេសកម្ពុជាប្រហែលតស៊ូបានពីជំហរថ្មីរបស់ចិន ប៉ុន្តែរោងចក្រថាមពលចំនួន ១៤ផ្សេងទៀត នៅក្នុងប្រទេសឥណ្ឌូនេស៊ី និងវៀតណាមត្រូវបានលុបចោលជាផ្លូវការ។ នេះបើយោងតាមការបញ្ជាក់ពីមជ្ឈមណ្ឌល CREA អំពីការផ្អាកនូវការផលិតអគ្គីសនី ១៥.៦ ជីហ្គាវ៉ាត់ នៅពីរប្រទេសខាងលើនេះ។ 

លោក Lauri Myllyvirta អ្នកវិភាគនៅមជ្ឈមណ្ឌល CREA មានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «ការធ្លាក់ចុះយ៉ាងខ្លាំងនៃតម្លៃ ក្នុងការប្រើប្រាស់ថាមពលស្អាត និងការតម្លើងថ្លៃទៅលើធ្យូងថ្មនេះ ជាឱកាសមួយសម្រាប់រដ្ឋាភិបាលកម្ពុជា ដើម្បីធ្វើការពិនិត្យឡើងវិញថា តើធ្យូងថ្មជាជម្រើសល្អ សម្រាប់បំពេញតម្រូវការថាមពលនៅកម្ពុជាដែរឬទេ»។ 

លោក Myllyvirta មានប្រសាសន៍ថា កម្ពុជាកំពុងឈានចូលដំណាក់កាលស្រពិចស្រពិល ជាពិសេស ដោយសារតែប្រទេសនេះ ភា​គច្រើនពឹងផ្អែកលើការនាំចូលធ្យូងថ្មពីបរទេស។

«តម្លៃធ្យូងថ្មឡើងចុះមិនទៀងទាត់ ហើយទីផ្សារធ្យូងថ្មជុំវិញពិភពលោកកាលពីបីឆ្នាំមុន បានបង្ហាញឱ្យឃើញថា សេដ្ឋកិច្ចមានហានិភ័យដែលត្រូវពឹងផ្អែកទៅលើផូស៊ីលឥន្ធនះ ក្នុងការផលិតអគ្គីសនី»។ លោកបានបន្តរៀបរាប់ថា តម្លៃនឹង «កាន់តែប្រែប្រួល» នៅពេលពិភពលោកលែងនិយមប្រើប្រាស់ធ្យូងថ្មជាប្រភពថាមពល។

នៅក្នុងឆ្នាំ ២០២១ កម្ពុជាបាននាំចូលធ្យូងថ្មក្នុងរង្វង់ទឹកប្រាក់ប្រមាណជា ២២២ លានដុល្លារអាមេរិក នេះបើយោងទៅតាម ប្រព័ន្ធទិន្នន័យស្ថិតិពាណិជ្ជកម្ម (UN Comtrade Database) ដែលបានធ្វើឡើងដោយ Atlas of Economic Complexity របស់ Harvard Growth Lab។​

ទិន្នន័យស្ថិតិពាណិជ្ជកម្មខាងលើបានសង្កត់ធ្ងន់ទៅលើតួនាទីរបស់ឥណ្ឌូនេស៊ីថា ជាអ្នកនាំចូលធ្យូងថ្មដ៏ធំបំផុត មកកាន់កម្ពុជាជាងមួយទសវត្សរ៍មកនេះ។ ប្រមាណ ៨៥ភាគរយ នៃធ្យូងថ្មដែលបាននាំចូលមកកាន់កម្ពុជា ចាប់តាំងពីឆ្នាំ ២០១២ រហូតដល់ឆ្នាំ ២០២១ គឺជាការនាំចូលពីឥណ្ឌូនេស៉ី។ 

ចំណែកឯលោក Zulfikar Yurnaidi ជាមន្ត្រីជាន់ខ្ពស់នៅមជ្ឈមណ្ឌលថាមពលអាស៊ាន ក្នុងរាជធានីហ្សាកាតា បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា «ភាពសម្បូរបែបនៃប្រភពថាមពល» ដែលកើតឡើងជុំវិញពិភពលោក នឹងកាន់តែធ្វើឱ្យ [អគ្គីសនី] ធ្យូងថ្មកាន់តែមានភាពស្រពិចស្រពិលនៅថ្ងៃមុខ។ លោក Yurnaidai បានពន្យល់ថា «ប្រតិកម្មទៅនឹងធ្យូងថ្ម» នៅឆាកអន្តរជាតិ នៅតែបន្តជាបញ្ហាដែលអាស៊ាន មិនអាចដោះស្រាយបាន។

«យើងមិនអាចបន់ស្រន់ឱ្យ [ធ្យូងថ្ម និងផូសុីលឥន្ធនះ] វាទៅបាត់ភ្លាមៗនោះទេ» លោក​​ Yurnaidi មានប្រសាសន៍។ លោកបន្តថា «ការគាំទ្រហិរញ្ញប្បទានពីរដ្ឋាភិបាលបរទេសនៅតែមានភាពចាំបាច់។ ប្រហែលជាមិនមែនសម្រាប់សាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីដែលបង្ករផលប៉ះពាល់ ប៉ុន្តែជួយឱ្យយើងអាចកាត់បន្ថយការបំភាយឧស្ម័នផ្ទះកញ្ចក់ ដោយធ្វើបច្ចុប្បន្នភាពរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម និងវិនិយោគលើថាមពលដែលកកើតឡើងវិញ» ។

នៅពេលដែលជំនួយសាងសង់ខ្សត់ទៅៗ គេចាប់ផ្តើមមើលឃើញ មានជំនួយគាំទ្រថាមពលបៃតង នៅអាស៊ី​អា​គ្នេ​យ៏ និងជំនួយដល់គម្រោង Just Energy transitions នៅវៀតណាម និងឥណ្ឌូនេស៊ី ។

ទោះបីជាអាស៊ានមានជំនួយពីបរទេសក៏ពិតមែន លោក Yurnaidi បានលើកឡើងថា តម្រូវការធ្យូងថ្ម នឹងនៅតែជាតម្រូវការរបស់អាស៊ាន ទៅះបីជាបណ្តាប្រទេសដែលជាសមាជិក ងាកទៅរកថាមពលកកើតឡើងវិញក៏ដោយ។

«អាស៊ាន [ប្រៀបបីដូច] ជាសំពៅដ៏ធំមួយដែលផ្ទុកមនុស្សរាប់សិបលាននាក់ និងមាន GDP រាប់លានកោដ»។ ការងាកទៅរកថាមពលថ្មី យើងត្រូវយល់ថា កប៉ាល់នេះត្រូវតែបែរក្បាល។ ប៉ុន្តែយើងមិនបង្វិលចង្កូតបានភ្លាមៗនោះទេ ពីព្រោះថាបើយើងធ្វើដូច្នេះមែន អ្នកនៅលើសំពៅនឹងអស់ជំហរ ហើយធ្លាក់ចូលសមុទ្រជាមិនខាន»។ លោកបន្ថែម។​ 

ការពឹងផ្អែកលើធ្យូងថ្ម

ក្រោយជម្ងឺកូវីដ១៩ ផែនការមេក្នុងការអភិវឌ្ឍអគ្គីសនីនៅកម្ពុជា បានចេញផ្សាយជាសាធារណៈនៅឆ្នាំ ២០២៣ បង្ហាញអំពីផែនការបង្កើនផលិតកម្មថាមពលនៅកម្ពុជា ចាប់ពីឆ្នាំ ២០២២ ដល់ឆ្នាំ ២០៤០ ព្រមទាំងបានធ្វើការព្យាករណ៍អំពីតម្រូវការថាមពលទូទាំងប្រទេស។

ប្រាំឆ្នាំដំបូងនៃ «សេណារីយ៉ូថាមពល» នៃគម្រោងនេះ បានផ្តល់អទិភាព ដល់ការអភិវឌ្ឍរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម ចំនួនបីកន្លែង ដែលជារោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មចុងក្រោយ របស់កម្ពុជាផងដែរ។

នៅក្នុងកិច្ចប្រជុំមួយ មុនសន្និសីទស្តីពីការប្រែប្រួលអាកាសធាតុលើកទី ២៦ របស់អង្គការសហប្រជាជាតិ ឬហៅថា COP26 រដ្ឋមន្ត្រីក្រសួងរ៉ែ និងថាមពលរបស់កម្ពុជា ឯកឧត្តម ស៊ុយ សែម មានប្រសាសន៍ថា កម្ពុជានឹងមិនអនុម័តគម្រោងធ្យូងថ្មបន្ថែមទៀតទេ។

ការពន្យារពេលសាងសង់ជាច្រើនឆ្នាំរបស់រោងចក្រថាមពលចំនួនពីរ បានធ្វើឱ្យអ្នកជំនាញផ្នែកថាមពលមួយចំនួន មានការបារម្ភចំពោះកង្វះថាមពលដែលអាចនឹងកើតមាន។ លោក ជា សោភ័ណ ដែលជាអ្នកជំនាញខាងអភិវឌ្ឍន៍ថាមពលកកើតឡើងវិញ បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា កង្វះខាតនឹងអាស្រ័យលើថា តើសេដ្ឋកិច្ច និងតម្រូវការថាមពលក្រោយកូវីដរបស់កម្ពុជា ងើបឡើងមកវិញប៉ុណ្ណា។

ខណៈពេលដែលអ្នកវិនិយោគក្រៅស្រុកលែងចាប់អារម្មណ៍នឹងផូសុីលឥន្ធនះ លោក សោភ័ណ បានសង្កត់ថា ការធានាឱ្យមានការជួយគាំទ្រ មកលើគម្រោងសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីទាំងពីរនេះ មានភាពលំបាកណាស់។

«តើវិនិយោគិនរូបណា ដែលនៅតែអាចផ្តល់ហិរញ្ញប្បទានដល់រោងចក្រដែលជាប់គាំងបែបនេះ?» លោកសោភ័ណ្ឌបានលើកឡើងបែបនេះ និង​បាន​ពន្យល់​ថា បើ​គ្មាន​ប្រទេស​ចិន វាអាចនឹងគ្មាន ឬមានការប្រែក្លាយគម្រោងនេះតិចតួចបំផុត។

ឯកឧត្តម ជៀប សួរ នៃ​ក្រសួង​រ៉ែ និង​ថាមពល បាន​បដិសេធ​មិន​ធ្វើ​អត្ថាធិប្បាយ​ ហើយ​បាន​បង្វែរ​ទៅ​ឯកឧត្តម ហេង គុណលាង អ្នក​នាំ​ពាក្យ​ក្រសួង ដោយ​លោកបានអាន ប៉ុន្តែមិនបានឆ្លើយតបមកកាន់សារ​ជា​អក្សរ និង​សំឡេង​របស់ក្រុមការងារ Globe នោះទេ។ ចំណែកឯកឧត្តម អ៊ឹង ឌីប៉ូឡា អគ្គនាយក​នៃ​នាយកដ្ឋាន​រ៉ែ​នៃ​ក្រសួង​មិន​អាច​ធ្វើ​អត្ថាធិប្បាយ​បាន​ទេ។

សំណង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មនៅកម្ពុជា

នៅខេត្តឧត្តរមានជ័យ ផលវិបាកផ្នែកហិរញ្ញវត្ថុកំពុងជំរុញឱ្យក្រុមហ៊ុនដែលជួយដល់រោងចក្រថាមពល ហានសេង ដែលមានតម្លៃ ៣៧០លានដុល្លារ ចាប់គិតគូរឡើងវិញ។

របាយការណ៍ពាក់កណ្តាលឆ្នាំ ២០២២ របស់ក្រុមហ៊ុន Guodian Kangneng Technology Stock Co. បានបង្ហាញថា ប្រាក់ចំណេញសុទ្ធ ដែលជាកម្មសិទ្ធិរបស់ភាគទុនិកនៅក្នុងឆមាសទីមួយនៃឆ្នាំនេះ បានទទួលរងនូវការថយចុះជិត ៩០ ភាគរយ ពីមួយឆ្នាំទៅមួយឆ្នាំ ដោយម្ចាស់ភាគហ៊ុនធំមួយ គ្រោងនឹងកាត់បន្ថយភាគហ៊ុនរបស់ពួកគេ ពីរលានភាគហ៊ុន។

នៅក្នុងខែកញ្ញា ក្រុមហ៊ុន Huazi International ជាអ្នកម៉ៅការថ្មី បានមកកាន់គម្រោងនេះម្តង។ ផែនការសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីដើរដោយធ្យូងថ្ម ២៦៥មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ មិនបានផ្លាស់ប្តូរទេ ប៉ុន្តែក្រុមហ៊ុន Huazi បានប្រកាសពីគម្រោងក្នុងការបន្ថែម ថាមពលដើរដោយពន្លឺព្រះអាទិត្យ ២០០ មេហ្គាវ៉ាត់ នៅទីតាំងដដែល។ នេះជាលើកទីមួយហើយ ដែលការផលិតថាមពលប្រភេទផ្សេង បែរមកបន្ថែមនឹងផែនការរបស់រោងចក្រថាមពល ហាន សេង ដែលកំពុងជួបការលំបាកស្រាប់។

ចំណែកការដ្ឋានជីកធ្យូងថ្មយន់ឃាង ដែលគេសន្មត់ថា នៅថ្ងៃអនាគត អាចនឹងផ្គត់ផ្គង់ទៅរោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី ដែលមិនទាន់បញ្ចប់ការសាងសង់មួយនេះ កំពុងដំណើរការធម្មតា នៅចម្ងាយប្រហែលពីរគីឡូម៉ែត្រ ពី​គ្នាតែប៉ុណ្ណោះ។

លោកអ៊ុំ បូយ ត្រុច ដែលបានរស់នៅជាប់គំនរអាចម៍ដីរ៉ែនៅក្បែរការដ្ឋាន ជិតមួយទសវត្សរ៍ទៅហើយនោះ ជឿថា សកម្មភាពធ្យូងថ្មបានបំពុលទឹកក្រោមដី​ នៃដីស្រែរបស់គាត់។ លោកអ៊ុំបានបន្តថា វាធ្វើឱ្យស្រូវរបស់គាត់ឡើងក្រហម និងប៉ះពាល់ដល់សត្វចិញ្ចឹមរបស់គាត់។

ជាមួយនឹងនាឡិកាដៃពណ៌មាសដែលមានរូបអតីតនាយករដ្ឋមន្ត្រី ហ៊ុន សែន លោកអ៊ុំ ត្រុច ចង្អុលទៅគំនរអាចម៌រ៉ែ ហើយបានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «មានដីជាច្រើនដែលរងផលប៉ះពាល់ ដោយសារអាចម៌រ៉ែនេះ ប៉ុន្តែមេភូមិ និងមេឃុំមិនអើពើ”។ ជាមួយនឹងចៅរបស់គាត់ដើរក្បែរ លោកអ៊ុំត្រុច បានបន្តថា គាត់ខ្លាចការជីកយករ៉ែធ្យូងថ្មនឹងកាន់តែរីកដុះដាល នៅក្នុងភូមិរបស់គាត់ ប្រសិនបើរោងចក្រថាមពលចាប់ដំណើរការមែន។

«អញ្ចឹងបានថា យើងជាប្រជាពលរដ្ឋមិនហ៊ានតវ៉ាទេ ព្រោះប្រជាពលរដ្ឋយើងទន់ខ្សោយ» លោកអ៊ុំបានមានប្រសាសន៍។ «បើគេឱ្យនៅវាគ្រាន់ ប៉ុន្តែខ្លាចតែគេមិនឱ្យនៅទៀត‍»។ 

នៅឯខេត្តកោះកុងវិញ ក្តីកង្វល់របស់ប្រជាពលរដ្ឋក៏ដូចគ្នាទៅនឹងការព្រួយបារម្ភរបស់លោកអ៊ុំដែរ។

ក្រុមហ៊ុន Royal Group ដែលជាក្រុមហ៊ុនវិនិយោគធំជាងគេមួយ ក្នុងប្រទេសកម្ពុជាដែលមានទំនាក់ទំនងជាមួយសម្តេច ហ៊ុន សែន បានទទួលសម្បទានដីជិត ១៧០ ហិកតាក្នុងឆ្នាំ ២០២០ ក្នុង ឧទ្យានជាតិបុទុមសាគរ សម្រាប់រោងចក្រថាមពលធ្យូងថ្ម។

ប្រជាពលរដ្ឋ​រស់នៅ​លើ​ដី​នេះ​បាន​ត្អូញត្អែរ​ពី​ការ​បណ្តេញ​ចេញ​ និង​សំណង​ក្នុងទឹកប្រាក់តិចតួច ពីក្រុមហ៊ុនឯកជន។ ផ្ទះ​របស់​លោកពូ កែវ ខន ត្រូវ​បាន​កម្ទេច​ចោល​ក្នុង​ឆ្នាំ ២០២១ ដោយ​កងកម្លាំងចម្រុះរបស់អាជ្ញាធរ។ ក្នុងនោះមានអ្នកដែលត្រូវបាត់បង់ដីចំនួន ៣៧​នាក់ បាន​រួមគ្នាដាក់​ញត្តិ ដើម្បីទាមទារសំណង និងសង្ឃឹមថានឹងទទួលបានសំណាងសមរម្យជាងនេះ។

«ពួកយើងទាំងអស់គ្នា ប្រមូលគ្នាដើម្បីតវ៉ានឹងក្រុមហ៊ុន» លោកពូខន បានមានប្រសាសន៍។ លោកពូបានបន្តថា៖ «គេដឹងតើ! អភិបាលខេត្ត ហើយនឹងមន្ទីរ ប៉ុន្តែអត់មានពីណាជួយអីយើងបានផង»។

គ្មានសកម្មភាពសាងសង់រោងចក្រធ្យូងថ្មនៅខេត្តកោះកុងនោះទេ ប៉ុន្តែ​ព្រៃឈើ​កំពុង​ត្រូវ​បានគេ​កាប់​ឆ្ការ ​នៅ​ជុំវិញ​ទីតាំង​គម្រោង​ដែលគេ​បាន​កំណត់។ តំបន់ទាំងនេះផងដែរ នៅក្នុងឧទ្យានជាតិត្រូវបានផ្តល់ឱ្យទៅក្រុមហ៊ុន Royal Group ក្នុងសម្បទានដីជិត 10,000 ហិកតានៅឆ្នាំនេះ។

លោក Thomas Pianka ជាអនុប្រធានផ្នែកថាមពលរបស់ក្រុមហ៊ុន Royal Group បាត្រនឆ្លើយតបថា៖ «ខ្ញុំអត់ត្រូវការនិយាយជាមួយអ្នកទេ» បន្ទាប់ពីក្រុមការងារ Globe បានណែនាំខ្លួន។

នៅក្រុងព្រះសីហនុ រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីដើរដោយធ្យូងថ្មពីរកំពុងដំណើរការ នៅតែបង្កជាក្តីកង្វល់ ទាក់ទងនឹងបញ្ហាសុខភាពដល់ប្រជាពលរដ្ឋនៅស្រុកស្ទឹងហាវ។

រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្មក៏មានការពាក់ព័ន្ធជាមួយនឹងកត្តាដែលបង្កឱ្យមានជម្ងឺមហារីកដែរ។ ការស្រាវជ្រាវ ដែលធ្វើឡើងកាលពីឆ្នាំ ២០១៩ បានប៉ាន់ស្មានថា នៅឆ្នាំ ២០២៥ ជម្ងឺមហារីកសួត ១.៣៧ លានករណី នឹងកើតឡើងនៅជុំវិញពិភពលោក។​

លោកពូ សាង សារ៉ូ ជាសន្តិសុខ និងជាអ្នករស់នៅក្បែររោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីធ្យូងថ្ម Cambodian Energy Limited ក្នុងស្រុកស្ទឹងហាវ បានមានប្រសាសន៍ថា បុគ្គលិកនៅរោងចក្រ មានការព្រួយបារម្ភ អំពីផលប៉ះពាល់សុខភាព។ លោកពូបានបន្តថា ខាងរោងចក្រ មិនដែលប្រាប់អំពីផលប៉ះពាល់ទាំងនេះ ដល់បុគ្គលិកទេ។

មេ​ភូមិ​របស់​គាត់​ គឺអ៊ុំស្រី លី សុជាតិ មាន​ប្រសាសន៍​ថា អ្នកស្រុកតែងតែរអ៊ូរទាំ អំពីក្លិនដែលភាយចេញពីធ្យូងថ្ម។ អ៊ុំស្រីបានរៀបរាប់ថា អ្នកភូមិរបស់​គាត់​ឈប់​ប្រមូល​ទឹកភ្លៀង​ហើយ ដោយ​សារតែខ្លាច​មានសារធាតុពុលដល់បរិយាកាសពីបង្កឡើងពីធ្យូងថ្ម។

ក្នុងនាមជាមេភូមិមួយរូប អ៊ុំស្រីបានចូលរួមការប្រជុំ ទាក់ទងនឹងឱកាសការងារ សម្រាប់ប្រជាជនក្នុងសហគមន៍ជាច្រើនដងក៏ពិតមែន ប៉ុន្តែខាងរោងចក្រ មិនដែលធ្វើការណែនាំ អំពីផលប៉ះពាល់ពីធ្យូងថ្មនោះ។ 
នៅពេលដែលក្រុមការងារកំពុងអង្គុយក្នុងទូកជាមួយលោក ហង្ស តារា នៅក្បែររោងចក្រនោះ គាត់បាន​រៀបរាប់​ថា នេះជាមូលហេតុដែល​គាត់ផ្លាស់ការងារ ​ពី​ជាង​ភ្លើងនៅ​រោងចក្រ​អគ្គីសនី ​ទៅ​ជា​អ្នក​នេសាទ​។

លោក ដារ៉ា បានលើកឡើងអំពីអាការៈឈឺក្បាលខ្លាំង និងក្អកញឹកញាប់ នៅពេលដែលគាត់បំពេញការងារនៅរោងចក្រ។ លោកបានបន្តថា៖ «ខ្ញុំពិតជាបារម្ភអំពីសុខភាពរបស់ខ្ញុំណាស់»។ លោកបានបន្តរៀបរាប់ថា៖ «ឥលូវនេះខ្ញុំបារម្ភអំពី [ផលប៉ះពាល់ដល់សុខភាព] ត្រីម្តង»។ 

នៅពេលដែលលោកដារ៉ាឈរនៅលើក្បាលទូក លោកពូ លយ ឆែម កំពុងអង្គុយកាន់ចង្កូតទូកនៅខាងក្រោយ។ ពេលដែលពួកគាត់បើកទូកកាត់ផែផ្ទុកធ្យូងថ្ម របស់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនី លោកពូឆែមងើបឈរពីកន្លែងអង្គុយរបស់គាត់ រួចចង្អុលទៅត្រីដូហ្វីន ដែលកំពុងងើបចេញពីផ្ទៃទឹក។

លោកពូឆែមបាបមានប្រសាសន៍ថា៖ «ឥលូវខ្ញុំមិនសូវឃើញត្រីដូហ្វីនច្រើនទេ។ ពួកវាលែងនៅដោយសារធ្យូងថ្ម។ ដូចយើងអញ្ចឹង…ពួកវារស់ទៅរស់នៅកន្លែងឆ្ងាយៗពីនេះ»។ លោកពូបានពន្យល់ទៀតថា សព្វថ្ងៃនេះ ទាល់តែគាត់បើកទូកចេញទៅក្បែរខេត្តកោះកុង ទើបអាចរកត្រីបាន។ គួរបញ្ជាក់ផងដែរថា ក្រុមហ៊ុន Royal Group មានគម្រោងសាងសង់រោងចក្រអគ្គីសនីដើរដោយការដុតធ្យូងថ្មនៅខេត្តកោះកុង។  

ស្របពេលដែលលោកពូក្រឡេកមើលដីគោគរួច គាត់បានពោលថា៖ «ប្រសិនបើគេសាងសង់រោងចក្រមែន ទាំងយើង ទាំងត្រី លែងមានកន្លែងរត់គេចទៀតហើយ»។

រាយការណ៍បន្ថែម៖ Andrew Haffner និង ឡាយ សុផាន់ណា
អត្ថបទនេះទទួលបានការគាំទ្រពីជំនួយ News Reporting Pitch Initiative ពីមូលនិធិខុនរ៉ាតអាឌិនណៅអ៊ែរ​ Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung ប្រចាំកម្ពុជា

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