Sand mining in Cambodia is being seen as a major hurdle for the environment. The serene rivers tend to become an industrial nightmare with flotillas of dredgers operating 24 hours a day, scooping up sand and piling it onto ocean-bound barges.
The vessels add to the churning up of the water and fuel leaks in the river compounding the problem. The fish are dying, the riverbanks are collapsing and the pollution is likely to kill all the ecotourism in the area. The case that exemplifies this is the Tatai River in Cambodia’s Koh Kong province. The mining operation here is in violation of several legal restrictions of Cambodia, but it continues unhampered despite a recent government order to suspend mining temporarily.
The sand that is the root behind Cambodia’s troubles is the answer to Singapore’s problems. Singapore uses the sand as landfill and as a construction aid. The Construction and Building Authority refuse to say where they get the sand from. The National Development Ministry said the state's infrastructure development company buys it from a diverse range of approved sources.
While it is not admitted officially the sand does come from the Gulf of Thailand from both approved and non approved mining operations. Singapore needs the sand for the reclamation projects and is willing to not look too closely at its sources of sand. The U.N. figures show that Cambodia supplied 25 percent of Singapore's imports in 2010, followed by Vietnam, Malaysia, Myanmar and the Philippines. Not all the operations are taking the environmental concerns into consideration.