Cambodia: A Brief Introduction

Cambodia is a country in Southeast Asia with a population of approximately 16.9 million (2023)1 that is 74% rural.2 Cambodia has a tropical climate characterized by a monsoon season with heavy rainfall and notable geographic features include the Mekong River and Tonle Sap Lake, their basins covering 80% of Cambodia’s landmass, leaving it highly susceptible to seasonal flooding.3 These waterways are vital for Cambodia’s agriculture and fisheries sectors, which produce 25% of GDP and employ 49% of the country’s labor force.4 Cambodia's vulnerability to climate change is closely intertwined with its status as a post-civil war, largely agrarian nation, a condition that is further heightened by weak adaptive capacity, inadequate infrastructure, and limited institutional support. In Cambodia, the adverse effects of climate change are expected to disproportionately affect several key populations: poor households, Indigenous communities such as the Bunong and Kuy, and other marginalized groups. These groups often depend on climate-sensitive livelihoods like agriculture and fisheries, reside in climate-vulnerable riverine areas, the highland and coastal regions, and have limited adaptive capacity. This capacity is further weakened by the legacies of imperialism, decades of proxy wars, and ongoing geopolitical tensions. The increasing militarization of the South China Sea by the United States, aimed at cementing trade ties, and the shifting influence of neighboring powers like China and Vietnam,5 have left Cambodia’s adaptive strategies constrained by external pressures and reduced sovereignty, hindering effective responses to climate change.

Mapping Major Climate Events and Climate-Induced Displacement

As ranked by the ND-GAIN Matrix, Cambodia has both a great need for improvements in readiness and a great urgency for action as the 53rd most vulnerable and the 159th most ready country for climate change.6 Cambodia faces high rates of exposure to storms, cyclones, landslides, and droughts, among these riverine flooding is the most significant hazard Cambodia confronts– the second being epidemic disease.7 For instance, between 1996 and 2013, there were 3564 flood disaster occurrences, more frequent than droughts (1343) and storms (1585) combined.8 The low-lying plains and areas along the Mekong River are particularly susceptible to flooding, while droughts frequently affect the northern and central regions. In Cambodia, thousands of people have been internally displaced due to such climate events, compounded by the challenges of limited infrastructure and resources to provide adequate refuge. Between 2008 and 2023, Cambodia experienced 179 major climate displacement events that included dry and wet landmass movements, wildfires, floods, and storms. Between 2008 and 2015, there were 615,900 reported displacements attributed to such events, and between 2016 and 2023, there were 285,300.9 For instance, the September 2011 floods affected over 1.5 million people, destabilizing 18 provinces out of 24 in Cambodia, destroying crops and infrastructure and causing 247 reported deaths. Land was covered by standing flood water for weeks beyond the flood itself and only began receding months later, causing long-term displacement for many affected.10

Mapping the Costs of the Climate Crisis

The climate crisis further exacerbates existing economic challenges by increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events across Cambodia, particularly in the form of floods. The historic 2011 flood had a profound impact on several key economic sectors. The transportation sector suffered the most, with damages amounting to $344.4 million, representing 57% of the total losses. The agriculture sector also faced substantial damages, totaling $179.6 million, or 29% of the overall financial impact. Overall, Cambodia incurred costs exceeding $625 million due to the damages of this disaster.8  Similar occurrences include Typhoon Ketsana in 2009 and floods in 2014 that caused damages and losses of US$132 million and US$357 million, respectively.11  Historical analyses find that every year, Cambodia faces an average cost of US$54 million for emergency response to floods alone.11  More recent flood events in October 2020 incurred costs associated with road repairs at nearly $91 million USD, while farmers report struggling with rising costs due to disrupted transport links.12 The indirect economic costs of such events are also significant. Reductions in instructional time due to school closures from flooding negatively affect student learning, potentially increasing dropout rates and negatively impacting their labor market outcomes in the future. Most provinces have at least one school susceptible to significant annual flooding, and it is estimated that this flooding disrupts the education of about 1 percent, or 30,000, Cambodian students each year.13  

Mapping Resilience and Mitigation Pathways

Cambodia submitted its updated Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) in December 2020, increasing its mitigation ambition with an emissions reduction target of 41.7% by 2030 compared to business as usual. They have also set a target to halve the deforestation rate by 2030, in line with the REDD+ strategy.14 Further, Cambodia has committed to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, which the government plans to accomplish by reversing deforestation and guiding the energy, transport, and industrial sectors towards a low-carbon growth trajectory.15  Cambodia has also collaborated with the UN Industrial Development Organization to launch the UNIDO project, which works with factories to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, cut other forms of pollution, reduce production costs and increase efficiency. By introducing environmentally sound technology methodology, the project addressed industrial pollution caused by the release of air, water, solid and liquid materials, and the discharge of toxic chemical waste.16 The Cambodian government has more recently welcomed a more localized response to the crisis at hand.  Established decentralized systems for local development planning and financing, like the Commune Investment Program (CIP), were designed to integrate resilience planning, raise community awareness, drive behavioral change, and support Cambodia's mitigation and adaptation goals.17

Necessary Changes 

Addressing the climate crisis and building climate resilience in Cambodia necessitates sustained commitment,  transparency, and substantial support for the grassroots efforts of those truly committed to the preservation of Cambodia’s ecological well-being. In 2023, the Cambodian government sentenced 10 youth activists from the group Mother Nature Cambodia to up to six years in prison each on charges of conspiring against the state for their climate activism.18 Occurrences such as this convey a troubling message to Cambodia's youth: the government consistently prioritizes special interests over environmental protection. While the nation's current initiatives are ambitious and hold the potential for significant impact, these policies cannot come at the expense of local communities and Indigenous peoples. In 2023, carbon offset projects–mainly national parks and partitioned nature preserves– proposed by the Cambodian government and international stakeholders led to the violations of the rights of the Chong Indigenous peoples in the form of forced evictions, loss of access to traditional lands, and inadequate compensation.19 Carbon offset initiatives cannot come at the expense of Indigenous communities' rights and livelihoods, and the Cambodian government, and the REDD+ Project which issue these carbon credits, must work to rectify this wrong and establish communal land titles and rights to the Chong community. Central to many of these failings is Cambodia’s decades-long proto-dictatorship. Cambodia functions as a de facto single-party state, with elections that lack competition, no independent media, and the ruling party's domination of all state institutions, wherein government critics and activists face extensive prosecution, and even violence. In the July 2023 national elections, Hun Sen, in power since 1985, transferred the role of prime minister to his son, Hun Manet.20 This consolidation of power hinders the government's ability to effectively and transparently address the climate crisis, as political priorities overshadow pressing environmental responsibilities at hand.