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An export ban. An impending lawsuit. An environmentalist protest.
The sand industry in Singapore faces challenges by the Cambodian government starting with a new ban on sand export that began on January 23 this year.
Discrepancies have been found in the data from the United Nations concerning the export and import trade. Singapore has reported 73.6 million tonnes of sand that came from Cambodia while Cambodia reported on 2.7 million tonnes of sand was exported to Singapore since 2007.
The huge difference in the reports and the decline of Cambodia’s marine eco-system has caused protests and strikes in a varies parts of Cambodia. These protests in the past have caused problems for the sand importers from Singapore.
Jack (not his real name), a marine coordinator for Singaporean-based sand importing company, has experienced a strike while mooring sand to be shipped back to Singapore.
He said, “There were a lot of complications due to weather then there was a protest, a strike. My vessel had to depart with lesser sand, only six thousand metric tonnes.”
Singapore is well known to be the world’s largest sand importer ever since 2008. In fact, one company would have roughly three to four vessel of sand per month with an estimated amount of 55 thousand tonnes of sand on each vessel.
According to Jack, the Cambodian sand export bans have affected the sand industry in Singapore. However, it is not significant as they still have other resources for sand.
Cambodia’s sand-dredging industry has been criticised to pose a threat to the marine eco-system and local livelihood of the country by Global Witness, an international non-profit organisation, in the year 2010.
Based on environmental reasons, countries like Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia brought forth bans and limitations on sand exports. This made Cambodia one of the main sand exporters for Singapore before the ban.
Up to this date, Cambodian environmentalist like Mother Nature has argued that Singapore is an immediate contributor to the decline of Cambodia’s ecosystem. There were even accusations of sand smuggling made by Singapore.
The Ministry of National Development (MND) has issued a statement saying that smuggling of sand or export permit forgery is not condoned by the Government on January 23, 2017.
Following up with the ban, a law firm, Eugene Thuraisingam LLP was hired on February 2, 2017, to investigate sand imports by Mother Nature, an environmental non-government organization. It was regarding the sand imports from Cambodia to Singapore.
Singapore’s statutory boards involved in sand imports were put under critical observation during the investigation conducted by the firm. There is a possibility for a lawsuit against the Singapore state with the information gathered by the firm. The legal firm has not yet disclosed any additional information regarding the investigation.
Losing one of its main supplier of sand, Singapore is now finding new ways to reduce the country’s usage of sand. One way to continue Singapore’s ever-growing land reclamation is by using a method that was traditionally used in Nederland called empoldering. It involves building a dyke to drain water from the area that is to be reclaimed. Engineers are currently working on unconventional ways to solve land shortage without using much sand.
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