"IN FOCUS: Cambodia’s US$16 billion ‘eco-city' raises financial and environmental concerns" 4 May 2024

The Bay of Lights- what is meant to be a US$16 billion 934-hectare “eco city”...is reshaping Cambodia’s southern coastline, a sparkling stretch of shallow water.

The area is being developed by a company called Canopy Sands. Its parent company is Prince Holding Group, a powerful conglomerate led by Mr Chen Zhi, a business tycoon from China who became a naturalised Cambodian in 2014...The city was master-planned by Singapore’s Surbana Jurong, a government-owned consultancy company specialising in infrastructure and urban development...

Hidden directly underneath a bridge along the coastal road that services the project, the last remaining residents of this local area have made a new home...The families here live at the edges of utter neglect. The cash handed out to them was barely enough to construct a simple home on a tiny plot...There are few options nearby for jobs...fisherfolk around Ream Bay say their catches have disappeared...many among the impacted locals CNA spoke to said their living conditions remain dismal and they have yet to receive land titles for their new plots, raising fears they could be moved somewhere else at a whim...

allegations about the source of Prince Holding Group’s wealth - and its involvement in illegal activity in Cambodia - have started to haunt the development...A report by Radio Free Asia (RFA)...mapped out the extensive overseas money networks, shell companies and cash traffickers that Prince allegedly used to move money and distribute online gaming software, as well as purported links to scam centres operating in Cambodia...It is an assertion denied by Prince...

Canopy Sands confirmed that Radisson Hotel Group and Greg Norman Golf Course Design (GNGCD) are two international brands set to be involved in the project...a spokesperson for Radisson said...“we take this new information seriously, and our legal team will be collaborating closely with our risk advisory consultants to conduct further investigations,”... A spokesman for GNGCD did not respond to specific enquiries about its dealings with Prince...

Canopy Sands says it follows an environmental management plan to ensure that “our activities not only comply with but aim to exceed environmental regulations”...The company also said it previously commissioned a water impact study... However, Canopy Sands did not share either study with CNA, nor was it available from the Cambodian Ministry of Environment...

Local media in Cambodia reported in 2020 that land reclamation had begun in Ream Bay before an environmental impact assessment had been undertaken...The contract to reclaim an initial 408 hectares for the Bay of Lights was won by China Harbor Engineering Company, a subsidiary of the state-owned enterprise China Communications Construction Company...The extent of sand dredging has experts concerned..."the intensity and the magnitude has increased and that poses a huge risk to the coastal and marine environment"...