Southeast Asia Globe

28/03/2024

Sixteen months after his arrest, a Cambodian government official was found not guilty of charges related to an “international primate smuggling ring” that is accused of trafficking thousands of endangered monkeys from Cambodia to the U.S.

But as one route for the drug-testing monkeys shut down, another opened wider – from Cambodia to Canada. Read our latest with Toronto Star, backed by Pulitzer Center and Rainforest Investigations Network

Cambodian imports of monkeys to Canada for pharmaceutical lab testing risks public health and next zoonotic outbreak.

15/12/2023

Our media group Globe Media Asia is looking for talents to join our team in Phnom Penh. Send us your resume and apply today!

📣[Job Announcement]
We're looking for talents for several positions to join our international team in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. If you're interested in working with us, check the job description at below link and apply today!

👉 Check the JD: https://globemediaasia.com/work-with-us/

23/11/2023

[Partner article] New financial technologies could open the door to financial inclusion and provide people across Cambodia with greater access to capital. As banks in Cambodia look to the future, Credit Bureau Cambodia Co., Ltd a plays a critical role in providing financial data infrastructure, thus enabling the move toward financial inclusion.

New financial technologies could open the door to financial inclusion and provide people across Cambodia with greater access to capital. As banks in Cambodia look to the future, Credit Bureau Cambodia plays a critical role in providing financial data infrastructure, thus enabling the move toward fin...

13/11/2023

As the Asia Pacific Climate Week and Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation gatherings get underway, expect public financial institutions like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank to showcase their plans for supporting “Just Transitions” schemes in the region. As both institutions have track records of financing coal-power projects, their proposals for supporting ‘coal-to-clean’ pathways should be intensely scrutinised.

Commitments from development banks like ADB and World Bank on just energy transitions should be carefully scrutinised.

10/11/2023

Confidential documents and maps leaked to Southeast Asia Globe from meetings between developers and government officials this year indicate at least two hydropower projects are underway in Cambodia's Virachey National Park.

As Southeast Asia races to cut reliance on fossil fuels, Cambodia is risking this regional biodiversity hot spot for renewable energy. The leaked 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.
Conservationists fear dams may jeopardise hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of conservation funding from the U.K. earmarked for Virachey for the sake of “clean” energy, the very definition of which they challenge.

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 than if felled.

With support from The Pulitzer Center 's Rainforest Investigations Network, Anton L. Delgado's latest story for Globe digs into this tightrope between conservation and development, tackling the growing debate over the true definition of "clean" energy.

Leaked documents show plans for hydropower dams in the massive borderland forest, threatening to damage a biodiversity hotspot.

07/11/2023

Vietnam isn’t a country of wine drinkers, let alone producers. But near the Central Highlands resort town of DaLat, at 1,600 meters elevation, the only complete winery in the former French Indochina has found a niche among the orchids, avocados and coffee for which these uplands are better known.

Formerly, Vietnam’s heat and humidity allowed only low yields of tart grapes, as French entrepreneurs turned their attention to sweeter fruit wines. Today, foreign investment and modern technology have created a far more palatable grape. The Ladora Winery farms its own grapes — cabernet sauvignon, shiraz, merlot and sauvignon blanc, plus a hybrid varietal called Cardinal — in vineyards near Phan Rang, not far from ancient Champa Empire ruins, and trucks them to the Highlands. Exports go primarily to Japan and South Korea.

Read about this unexpected industry in today’s feature, as Globe editor John Gotttberg Anderson.

With a growing passion for wine across Southeast Asia, vintners from across the region are trying their hand at winemaking.

31/10/2023

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

Underdeveloped gaming tour laws and near-lawless special economic zones could create opportunities for junket operators in Southeast Asia to cut in on Macau’s besieged VIP market. But even with seemingly good odds, their success is anything but a sure bet.

Today’s story by Coby Hobbs

As China cracks down on VIP gambling tours in Macau, often called junkets, Southeast Asian destinations look to fill the void left behind.

26/10/2023

Cambodia bet big on coal in 2020. The Kingdom doubled down on fossil fuels with plans for three new coal-fired power plants. This would have flipped most of the country's power production from renewable energy sources to coal.

The controversial decision bucked the global push for clean energy and dismayed sustainability advocates. But three years later, the announced power plants are facing years of delay – raising questions about when, or if, Cambodia's last coal projects will go online.

Globe's Anton L. Delgado documented the slate of projects across three provinces, as well as Cambodia's original coal-fired power complex.

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

The Kingdom’s plans for coal power expansion survived China’s promise to cut overseas coal investments. But most of the promised plants still aren’t built as volatile fuel prices and the push for clean energy threaten the future of coal

23/10/2023

In recent months, the Areng Valley in the Cardamom mountain range sparsely populated by villages of indigenous Chorng people, has found itself at the centre of a global debate about carbon credits – a development scheme organised under a U.N.-backed framework called REDD+.

These credits, intended to limit the emissions that cause climate change by preventing deforestation in places like Areng are often purchased by major polluters, including some of the world’s largest oil and gas firms, to offset their fossil fuel emissions by essentially sponsoring the protection of forests, in developing countries such as Cambodia. While proponents argue REDD+ offers states the financial incentives needed to keep forests standing, detractors believe that idea is merely an illusion.

Globe's Andrew Haffner and Anton Delgado, visited Areng Valley and spent several months investigating REDD+ projects in Cambodia.

This story was produced with support from Internews' Earth Journalism Network.

With controversy in its Southern Cardamom REDD+ project, the country is driving ahead on a major expansion of its climate finance schemes.

18/10/2023

Join us for the final episode of season 3 of Anakut podcast, where we explore Phnom Penh’s role in shaping Cambodia’s contemporary culture, focusing on the city’s role in bringing art, music and other creative pursuits to the eyes, ears, and minds of the public. Our hosts look at Phnom Penh’s evolving infrastructure supporting artistic endeavours, from art and music to various other lanes of creative craftsmanship. In the process, we hear from Sok Visal, founder of the music label and film production studio Klapyahandz - ក្លាបយ៉ាហ៊ែន, and Reaksmey Yean, an art history lecturer, curator and critic. They also caught up with Sievphin Chong, better known as his alter ego PEACE CHONG, an independent musician and digital culture creator. All share some unique perspectives on Cambodian culture evolution.

In the final episode of the third season of the Anakut podcast we do what we originally set out to do – delve deep into modern Cambodia and the vibrant people who inhabit it

10/10/2023

[Partner Content] On this World Mental Health Day 2023, with the theme ‘Mental health is a universal human right’, UNICEF Cambodia and UNFPA Cambodia spotlight the mental health of children, adolescents and youth in Cambodia.

A World Mental Health Day op-ed from the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA)

06/10/2023

We're excited to share with our readers the latest stories from Focus Cambodia. While Southeast Asia Globe recently suspended publishing, this week Focus began its regular coverage of Cambodia. Follow Focus Cambodia to "Discover a Kingdom" and read their latest articles, ranging from features about the country's must-see destinations to reports of seemingly souring relations with China.

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