“Ongoing project”

Mangrove forests are essential to coastal ecosystems, preventing erosion, improving water quality, and reducing coastal flooding. They also provide a vital habitat for a variety of terrestrial and marine species, including economically and ecologically significant fish that support communities living along the coastlines. 

From 1989 to 2017, Cambodia lost almost half of its mangrove forest at a rate of 1415 hectares per year. roughly 42% In the coastal provinces of Koh Kong, Kampot, Preah Sihanoukville, and Kep roughly 42% of these forests have been destroyed. Individual losses of mangrove areas in these four provinces during the study period were 39%, 45%, 52%, and 34%, respectively. 

Three main causes of mangrove forest destruction in Cambodia – salt farming, charcoal production, and shrimp farming – have been perceived and documented in literary reviews.

About 75-80% of people living on the Cambodian coast rely on fishing and without mangrove forests, their lives will become increasingly difficult.

In this series, I hope to communicate the importance of mangrove forests by documenting the consequences of their destruction and showcasing the restoration efforts of locals trying to regain what has been lost.

In researching this project, residents of coastal communities spoke of diminishing fishing yields, as mangrove forests in their area are destroyed to make way for hotels, roads, sand mining operations, and large-scale agriculture for the benefit of the rich and powerful.  

These developments destroy the vital and biodiverse habitats that straddle the ocean and land, negatively impacting the livelihoods of these fish-dependent communities.

These are not the only threats to mangrove forests. As temperatures rise due to climate change, extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and rising sea levels continue to threaten these fragile ecosystems and the vulnerable communities that depend on them. If humans don't work together to preserve and restore mangrove forests and prevent coastal erosion, we will all be left to face the catastrophic effects of innaction.

As these communities realize that the destruction of mangroves – both through development and human-accelerated climate change – severely affects their lives, they have begun working together to save the remaining mangroves and restore what was lost. My project hopes to tell this story of the severed relationship between coastal peoples and their land, and their attempts of restoration and reconciliation in the face of an increasingly hostile climate.