The afternoon sun beat down on the azure sea off the coast of Koh Rong, the largest island in Cambodia’s first marine national park in the southwestern province of Preah Sihanouk.
Mangrove forests skirted by lazily as Dy Chantha left Prek Svay, one of the island’s fishing villages, to patrol the waters of the community fishery, or CFi, off the northern tip of Koh Rong with a team of five other CFi officers in March 2024.
But the CFi speedboat could scarcely hold the five CFi officers, so Chantha, the group’s leader, took Mongabay reporters in his own fishing boat, following the CFi speedboat on its afternoon patrol of the 7,600-hectare (18,800-acre) community fishing grounds.
“If trawlers come inside the [CFi] boundary, it has a big impact, such as destroying the fish sanctuaries, the eggs, the turtle sanctuaries and seagrass,” Chantha said.
