Villagers in long wooden boats gather on the water in front of stilt houses on Tonle Sap

Tonle Sap, Cambodia

Protecting Tonle Sap Through Community Action

Working with Tonle Sap communities to reduce plastic pollution through education, action and participation.

Aerial view of a man in a small boat beside a floating mass of plastic waste — Plastic gathered on the water. Photo: NGO2 BambooShoot.

Plastic affects more than the lake.

Tonle Sap is the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia, and home to floating villages that depend on it.

Most floating villages have little or no waste collection. Plastic is burned, or it ends up in the water. In the wet season it hangs from the flooded trees. When the water falls, it is left on the ground. It wraps around boat propellers.

The environment
Communities
Fishing
Boats
Tourism
Livelihoods

We work with the people who live on the lake.

Community

Families sort and keep their household plastic instead of burning it or throwing it in the lake.

Education

Workshops in schools, youth groups and local government committees on single-use plastic.

Action

Clean-ups planned around the rising and falling of the lake.

Collaboration

Work with local government, sponsors and international partners.

Six programmes, one lake.

Our work is built around people, education and action.

Villagers raise fishing nets in the air after a clean-up

Programme

Community Action

Community clean-ups and local participation.

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Rows of filled Plastic Only collection bags

Programme

Harvest Plastic

Households collect and separate plastic before it reaches the environment.

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Young people jump holding hand-painted posters about plastic

Programme

Environmental Education

Education and awareness for communities and young people.

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A boat full of volunteers in red shirts on the lake

Event

Inland Ocean Festival

Culture, community and environmental awareness around Tonle Sap.

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Two people in a wooden boat surrounded by floating plastic

Research

Propeller Project

Research and awareness around plastic and fishing-net entanglement in boat propellers.

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Students in white shirts listen during a workshop

Challenge

Plastically Possible

Student art challenge: classes turn local plastic waste into animal art.

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What communities have done so far.

Every figure comes with its source.

Villages and areas where we have worked

Families recognised as clean families in Kampong Phluk, 2023

Phnom Penh Post, 26/06/23

643

Boat owners and users surveyed for the Propeller Project

Ocean Recovery Alliance, Propeller Project

Real communities around the lake.

Every year the lake grows from about 1 metre deep to 10 metres, and life on the water moves with it. These are the places where we have worked.

Mechrey

Chong Khneas

Siem Reap River

Kampong Phluk

Kampong Khleang

Rice for Plastic pilot, Chong Prolay

From education to environmental action.

2009
It starts with education
Sophal Sea co-founds NGO2 BambooShoot to help girls from rural villages go to high school in Siem Reap.
2018
Plastic can't be ignored
Guiding visitors by boat to Prek Toal, Sophal saw propellers caught in plastic. In 2018 the work turns to the lake.
Today
Action around the lake
Community programmes on plastic, education and research, with villages around Tonle Sap.

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From the water's edge.

A woman paddles a boat loaded with bags of collected plastic

Community

Rice for plastic: how a floating village kept going through Covid

When schools and festivals stopped, families in Chong Prolay kept sorting their plastic. Each month, youth volunteers checked the bags, and each family that kept its plastic received 5 kg of rice.

Chong Prolay, Kampong Khleang · 2020

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