Officials from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries have distributed and planted nearly 50,000 rosewood saplings across seven communes in Preah Vihear province’s Choam Ksan district to restore and protect two of the endangered species – Dalbergia cochinchinensis and Dalbergia oliveri.
Minister Veng Sakhon presented the progress of the pilot project to register private forests and rosewood plantations in the province. The project has seen the distribution of 48,590 rosewood saplings, 3,126 fruit seedlings and other tree species.
The project covers 86 lots in the communes of Teuk Krahom, Morakot, Choam Ksan, Ramdoh Sre, Kantuot, Sraem, and Yeang where saplings have been planted in natural forest areas as well as fences for houses, farmland, schools and police stations.
The project is funded by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
The project’s purpose is to study the condition of both rosewood species in the province and the favourable conditions to support the expansion and registration of these two types of small-scale private plantations.
“In order to restore and contribute to the protection of endangered rosewood resources and to recultivate this resource, the Forestry Administration has cooperated with CITES . . . to plant and distribute their saplings,” Sakhon said on July 11.
According to Sakhon, the Forestry Administration has cooperated with the CITES secretariat to start the project – “Integrating the Piloting of Small-scale Private Dalbergia cochinchinensis Plantation Registration with Forest Landscape Restoration in Preah Vihear Province” – for 18 months from 2020 to 2021.
Sakhon said agriculture officials cooperated with local authorities to organise the programme to replant rosewood seedlings on degraded forest land in the district. Volunteers have planted 4,350 saplings over the past 18 months.
Sakhon added that the working group has completed drafting guidelines on private forest registration and held a consultative meeting on November 26 and 27, 2020, with relevant authorities, the private sector and agricultural education institutions for additional input.
At the same time, the ministry’s working group has prepared registration procedures and related documents for private forests, including the registration application, the charge book and the certificate for a request for private forest registration.
The team has also prepared a technical report on the biology, ecology, habitat, status, trends, structure and dynamics of the rosewood species in the district.
Sakhon stated that in the past 18 months, the ministry’s working group has also monitored the saplings on the 86 lots in the natural forest area.
“The working group is currently preparing a report on the effectiveness of the management of conservation status, logging records, both legal and illegal, harvest areas, management measures and control of both types of timber, as well as a report evaluating the results of the inventory in accordance with the principles for preparing the report for CITES,” he said.
