Wildlife Alliance has been active across the Cardamom Rainforest Landscape since 2001, working with local governments and communities both prior to and since the inception of the Southern Cardamom REDD+ Project in 2015. The foundation of the project’s conservation work is its unique boots-on-the-ground enforcement, which is critical for effective protected area management in this extremely threatened landscape.
The Southern Cardamom REDD+ project has intensified efforts to improve local infrastructure in the project area, provide financial assistance in response to COVID-19, and help secure land rights through demarcation. The Project has focused on helping communities by providing tangible public benefits, which in turn increases people’s understanding of how keeping the forest standing benefits them directly.
The Cardamom mountains have long suffered from a hunting and poaching crisis, alongside habitat destruction due to slash-and-burn agriculture and land speculation. The REDD+ project established an award-winning conservation model centered around effective boots-on-the-ground protection of this highly threatened forest area. Since 2006, the project has achieved zero poaching of Asian elephants and supported significant […]
The project has developed a system of rescue, care and release to provide the best possible outcome for the traumatized or injured wild animals that are the victims of this poaching within the Cardamoms region. The forest protection units (rangers) operate across the Project Zone removing snares from the forest floor, rescuing wild animals from […]
In 2020, the Southern Cardamom REDD+ Project continued to face, and face down, an unrelenting series of threats to the forest and its wildlife, while providing communities with crucial support in the midst of the COVID pandemic. Ranging from small scale poaching to large scale corrupt land-grabbing, the project has tirelessly defended the highly threatened Cardamom forest.
This past quarter, the Southern Cardamom REDD+ Rangers have worked diligently to protect the biodiversity of both tree and animal species, with successful arrests of poachers and loggers. Additionally, Southern Cardamom REDD+ camera trappings have captured new images of dholes, an Endangered wild dog species that is crucially dependent on the continuous forest cover provided by the Cardamom Rainforest Landscape.
During the first quarter of 2020, before the arrival of Covid-19, 16 local communities directly benefitted from the economic alternatives supported by the Southern Cardamom REDD+ Project.
Wildlife Alliance are the global leaders in Direct Protection of Forests and Wildlife in Tropical Asia, and Asia needs effective enforcement. Weak government, the pervasive impact of Chinese investment, and the rapid growth of the consumer class throughout Asia are massively increasing pressure on the region’s wild places. The biggest current driver of deforestation in the Cardamoms is investment driven land speculation.