Blogs, News and Events

A central pillar of the BCOMING project is the engagement with communities that live in close proximity to areas where zoonotic risks are high. In the case of Cambodia the zoonotic risk is linked to bat populations that live in caves nearby Sam’ang village.

International Forest Day is an occasion to celebrate the importance of forests in our lives. Forests are not just a beautiful sight to see; they are essential for our overall health and well-being. Forests contribute to our health and life in various ways.

Wildlife is an integral part of our world, playing a vital role in maintaining healthy ecosystems. From an ecological point of view, animals help pollinate plants, disperse seeds, and control insect populations, which helps keep the balance of ecosystems. Additionally, many species are indicators of the environment's health, and their presence or absence can signal changes that could impact the health of humans. 

On the 18^th of December, the whole world welcomed the Kunming-Montreal Biodiversity Deal. The Deal has already been adopted by 200 countries and it has been built upon the goals and achievements of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 and other multilateral environmental agreements and it is fully aligned with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals.

The International Day of Epidemic Preparedness on December 27 serves the purpose of creating awareness about epidemics.

Biological samples as well as epidemiological, ecological, socio-economic and environmental data will be collected in both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems across all BCOMING study sites, while standardising and complementing the data collection initiated by the consortium members in their ongoing collaborative projects. 

The 4th edition of the African Days of Ecology and Climate Change, which opened on October 7, 2022 in Alepe, Ivory Coast, was an opportunity for the Ivorian government to present the Biodiversity Conservation Project in the Taï-Grebo-Sapo forest complex, which borders Liberia.

During our 1^st Advisory Board meeting, which took place on the 4^th of November, we were glad to e-meet our Advisory Board members and discuss the project’s vision and objectives.

Snares remained a challenge for wildlife in Cambodia’s protected areas, and result in the loss of many of the Kingdom’s endangered species.

In order to address the problem, in 2021, the Ministry of Environment and partner organisations removed over 60,000 snares from 72 protected areas and biodiversity corridors in Cambodia. On a more local level, new measures are being employed.

In 2014, as temperatures topped 40° Celsius, or 104° Fahrenheit, in eastern Australia, half of the region’s black flying fox (Pteropus alecto) population perished, with thousands of the bats succumbing to the heat in one day.

The Health Ministry is pushing for people who live in malaria hot spots to be tested for the serious and often fatal disease to be stepped up.

Two major scientific publications have just revealed some surprising findings about the world’s plant biodiversity. The first refutes a widely accepted theory : the climate is not the only factor explaining biodiversity in tropical forests. The second study shows that on a local scale, the Amazon rainforest and the steppes of Eastern Europe can harbour an equivalent number of plant species.