Co-Minister of Interior Sar Kheng said Monday that fishing grounds allocated to poor fishermen by the government are being sold to private businessmen.
“Fishing grounds have been handed over to local people, but local authorities are selling them,” Sar Kheng said at the Ministry of Interior’s annual report meeting. “This means poor people are still poor.”
“Please redirect this issue according to government policy,” he instructed government officials.
In late 2000, the government made public the rights to more than 500,000 hectares of fishing waters that had previously been privately leased. The transfer was designed to ease tensions between private lot-holders and poor local fishermen, who claimed that they had been forced off their traditional fishing grounds by businessmen.
Nao Thuok, director of the Department of Fisheries at the Ministry of Agriculture, agreed that some local officials are selling fishing grounds, contrary to a government subdecree banning such sales. “Some authorities are conniving with community chiefs to sell off fishing grounds set aside for fishermen,” Nao Thuok said Tuesday.
Ros Sirakkhemrrath, director of the Khmer Human Resource Development Organization, an NGO concerned with fisheries issues in Kompong Chhnang province, said Tuesday that several fishing grounds in Kompong Leng, Kompong Tralach and Cholkiri districts have been sold by local authorities, and have been blocked from public access.
“Some small fishermen have a hard time making a living,” Ros Sirakhemrrath said, adding that many fishermen have difficulty getting access to fishing grounds allocated to them that are located near private fishing lots in Kompong Chhnang province.
Another NGO worker said it is common for fishing grounds in provinces surrounding the Tonle Sap lake to be sold out by local authorities. Even so, government officials and NGO workers agree that the number of disputes over fishing lots has declined.
