MoE-LDCF Project

The Tonle Sap Basin (TSB), a vital economic and cultural region in Cambodia, is experiencing significant impacts from climate change, including rising temperatures, altered rainfall patterns (drier dry seasons and wetter wet seasons), and more frequent droughts and floods. These hazards, combined with accelerating forest degradation and unsustainable land management practices—such as agricultural expansion and insufficient water conservation measures—disrupt hydrological cycles, threaten water resources and agricultural productivity, and undermine natural resource-based livelihoods and tourism, a key economic sector. Consequently, communities are adopting maladaptive practices, such as clearing forests for agriculture, which further exacerbate environmental degradation.

To address these challenges, the Ministry of Environment (MoE), in collaboration with UNDP and with financial support from the Global Environment Facility (GEF), will implement a project titled “Building Resilient Livelihoods through Nature-Based Solutions in the Tonle Sap Basin and Siem Reap/Phnom Kulen Landscape.” The project will operate over five years, from 2026 to 2031, and aims to enhance community resilience to fluvial floods and droughts in the TSB, contributing to Cambodia’s green growth objectives. The approach includes conserving and rehabilitating degraded forest and riparian ecosystems to restore critical ecosystem services, such as regulation of hydrological flows. It also employs innovative financing mechanisms, including blended finance and challenge funds, to ensure long-term sustainability. Community engagement will address the root causes of degradation, such as shifting agriculture and monocropping of commodity trees, while preserving livelihoods and cultural heritage.