Royal University of Phnom Penh

The Royal University of Phnom Penh (RUPP) is Cambodia’s oldest and largest university. It hosts around 14,000 scholarship and full-fee paying students, across a diverse range of undergraduate and postgraduate programs. RUPP’s Department of Natural Resource Management and Development and its partner at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are working with communities to protect key species and sites along the Sekong, Srepok, and Sesan Rivers in Cambodia. The intended outcomes of the project include: creation of legally recognized community conservation areas and implementation of effective conservation incentive agreements with local communities to manage them.

The Royal University of Phnom Penh (RUPP) will identify important sites for key species along the Sekong and Sesan Rivers in Cambodia, pilot conservation incentive agreements with local communities; and establish indicators and monitoring protocols to track changes in the abundance of target species, quality of habitat, and the success of the conservation incentive programs. The riverine ecosystems of the Sesan and Sekong rivers hold unique biodiversity values that are not represented in Cambodia’s protected area system. They have also not been a priority for conservation investment in the past.