Deforestation in Cambodia : A story of land concessions, migration and resource exploitation

le 27/10/2021

Since the turn of the century, 27,000 km2 of land in Cambodia has been deforested. This is 14.8% of total land area in the country. It also represents 26.4% of forest cover as existed in 2000. The extent of the 2000 forest cover and 2001-2019 deforestation in Cambodia were computed by the authors using data made publically available by the Department of Geographical Sciences of the University of Maryland, see here for the data and related publication (Hansen et al., 2013). Forest are defined here as land with canopy closure (tree crown cover) higher than 10% and with trees able to reach minimum height of 5m (FAO 2001). Deforestation is defined as a stand-replacement disturbance or a change from a forest to non-forest state during the period 2000–2019.

All computations were conducted by the authors in QGIS.

Check the graphic story online on the link below