Building resilience of Cambodia's marine resources and coastal communities

Cambodia's waters support an incredible array of species and habitats including coral reefs, seagrass meadows, extensive mangrove forests, and marine turtles. However, they face severe threats from a range of factors, principally Illegal Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing.

FFI has supported Cambodia's Fisheries Administration (FiA) to establish and manage the country's first Marine Fisheries Management Area (MFMA) in the Koh Rong Archipelago taking a significant step towards meeting the Royal Government of Cambodia’s (RGC) commitment under the Convention for Biological Diversity to effectively conserve and equitably manage 10% of the country’s marine and coastal areas by 2020.

This project builds on the success enabled by grant No. 1745 by supporting partners to implement piloted sustainable financing mechanisms, guiding the trial and development of an IUU surveillance system to monitor illegal fishing and building the resilience of local communities both to capitalise on emerging economic opportunities and to implement climate adaptation strategies. In addition, they want to extend support to the Koh Sdach archipelago. This amazing archipelago boasts intact coral reefs, vast mangrove forests and seagrass beds hosting a wealth of biodiversity. Supporting the Provincial FiA with an integrated programme of capacity building offers the opportunity to lay the foundations for expanding the nascent Cambodia MPA network necessary to ensure greater biological and social resilience.