Appl.

Spatial Analysis (2016) 9:413–432

DOI 10.1007/s12061-015-9157-z

Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle

Sap Lake Area: A Spatial Approach

Aura Salmivaara 1 & Matti Kummu 1 & Olli Varis 1 &

Marko Keskinen 1

Received: 24 October 2013 / Accepted: 30 March 2015 /

Published online: 14 April 2015
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Abstract Cambodia’s Tonle Sap Lake will see major environmental changes due to the
Mekong hydropower development. These changes have remarkable societal impacts,
as the society is tightly connected with the physical geography through the lake’s
unique flood pulse. Understanding the connections between water and livelihoods is,
however, challenging due to the exceptional nature of the area and the gap between
demographic and environmental information. As a result, the socio-economic drivers
have been less analysed than the environmental changes. We addressed this research
gap by assessing the status quo and recent trends in the area’s socio-economic setting
with a spatial approach. The approach enabled presenting these trends and their
linkages to the physical environment in a way that conventional, administrative
boundaries-bound assessments are not able to do. We found that the economic activity
structure changed relatively modestly between 1998 and 2008, with the proportions of
the workforce within fishing and agriculture slowly decreasing. Yet, due to population
growth, there was a significant increase of 140,000 people in these sectors. Our
approach illustrated the spatial heterogeneity of the key socio-economic trends,
underlining the significant changes occurred particularly in Siem Reap. The results
also revealed an on-going ‘youth wave’ that brings a major demographic challenge –
but also an opportunity – for both urban and rural areas and also puts additional
pressure on natural resources. When planning the future development in the area, the
demographic transition and key socio-economic trends must be considered hand in
hand with the expected environmental impacts of hydropower development and climate
change.

Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s12061-015-9157-z)

contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

* Aura Salmivaara
aura.salmivaara@aalto.fi

1
Water & Development Research Group, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
Aalto University, Tietotie 1 E, 02150 Espoo, Finland
414 A. Salmivaara et al.

Keywords Spatial analysis . Population census . Socio-economic data . Zoning . Flood

pulse . Tonle Sap . Mekong Region

Introduction

The Tonle Sap Lake is a globally unique lake-floodplain system that forms an integral
part of the Mekong River system. The lake is also critically important in both economic
and hydrological terms for Cambodia and the lower Mekong River Basin (Baran et al.
2007; Dugan et al. 2010; Keskinen et al. 2013; Kummu et al. 2006; Ziv et al. 2012).
The seasonal flood pulse of the Tonle Sap (described in e.g. Keskinen 2006; Kummu
et al. 2006; Lamberts 2006) relates to practically all aspects of life, and lays a
foundation for the high biodiversity and exceptionally productive fisheries of the
lake-floodplain system. As a result, the Tonle Sap Lake is one of the most productive
freshwater fisheries in the world and the immense fish production of the lake forms the
backbone for the Cambodian food security (e.g. Lamberts 2001; Baran 2005; Hortle
2007; RGC 2010).
Due to the flood pulse system, fed largely by the Mekong mainstream, the Tonle Sap
lake-floodplain area and its 1.7 million people are vulnerable to potential changes in the
flows of the Mekong River. The most important driver for such changes is the on-going
large-scale hydropower development in the upper and central parts of the Mekong
River Basin that is likely to cause major negative impacts on the Tonle Sap system,
affecting the fisheries in particular (Arias et al. 2014; Junk et al. 2006;
Keskinen et al. 2010; Kingston et al. 2011; Kummu and Sarkkula 2008; Lauri
et al. 2012; Västilä et al. 2010).
In addition to the potential environmental pressures originating outside the area, the
increasing population and related development pressures within the Tonle Sap are
influencing the functioning of the floodplain ecosystem. Furthermore, the changes in
socio-economics and livelihood structure play a major role in shaping the future of the
area. Despite this, the recent studies and the related discussion about the future of the
Tonle Sap (e.g. the references above) have mainly focused on external drivers such as
the Mekong hydropower development, with less discussion about the internal socio-
economic challenges the area is facing. Yet, successful development of the area –
building on Cambodia’s National Strategic Development Plan (RGC 2010, 2013) –
would naturally require the simultaneous consideration of both external and
internal drivers.
The situation in the Tonle Sap resembles the challenges faced in general by
floodplain areas, where water intertwines the society tightly together with the physical
environment. This makes the integration of diverse information on hydrology, ecosys-
tems and society particularly topical (e.g. Leauthaud et al. 2012). The gap between
physical and socio-economic information, however, causes challenges for data integra-
tion. Such a gap is usually caused by differences in the availability, quantity and extent
of data as well as in linkages of data to physical environment. While hydrological and
environmental information is strongly related to geography, socio-economic data is
usually more heterogeneous and weaker in its spatial representation.
Population censuses, defined as the process of collecting and releasing demographic,
economic and social data pertaining to all persons and their living quarters (United
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 415

Nations 2010), are often the only source providing extensive, spatially referenced socio-
economic data. They are therefore regularly used in planning processes at both national
and sub-national level. For Cambodia and its Tonle Sap area, the two recent Population
Censuses of 1998 and 2008 – the first ones since the 1960s – provide essentially the only
opportunity to look at demographic and socio-economic trends in every village of the
country. Yet, to our knowledge, there have been very few analyses done on such trends
anywhere in Cambodia, and none in the specific context of the Tonle Sap.
In this study, we address this research gap by assessing both the status quo and the
recent socio-economic trends in the Tonle Sap Lake area through a spatial approach
utilising the two Population Censuses. While producing in-depth demographic and
socio-economic information on the area, such an approach also provides an opportunity
for integrating socio-economic data with spatial environmental information. This is
crucial given the major environmental impacts that the Tonle Sap system is likely to
experience in the near future. Information-wise, the main research questions of the
study are: What have been the key demographic and socio-economic trends in the
Tonle Sap area between 1998 and 2008; and how differing such trends have been in the
different parts of the lake-floodplain area.
In order to answer these two questions, methodologically our research focuses on
finding the optimal unit for the analysis, and particularly how spatial approach com-
bined with statistical methods can be used to optimise the unit of analysis. By using
spatially optimised zoning, we are able to put our study into broader context by creating
linkages between demographic and socio-economic trends and the largely externally-
driven environmental aspects in the Tonle Sap Lake area.
The study formed a part of the ‘Exploring Tonle Sap Futures’ project. This study
complements other studies of the project that focused on the Tonle Sap hydrology,
infrastructure development and policy options (Keskinen et al. 2013) as well as an
extensive household survey carried out in the area (Ward and Poutsma 2013). The
project aimed to guide planning and policy-making processes through integrated
research approach, and its main partner was the Tonle Sap Authority that is the key
governmental agency working in the Tonle Sap area.

Data and Methods

In order to extract the key information from the two Population Censuses and to
provide results that could be linked with physical environmental data, we used the
topographic zoning created for the area (Keskinen 2006) and tested and developed it
further. Our spatial approach brings forward the distinct spatial characteristics of the
area in a statistically valid and visually powerful way, while also maintaining the
connections to the administrative boundaries i.e. provinces. The data is analysed with
a spatial approach and the robustness of the approach has been tested statistically with
k-means clustering.
The Tonle Sap area is in this study defined to consist of the lake-floodplain area
between National Roads 5 and 6, with additional 3-km ‘buffer’ beyond the National
Roads to include the villages from both sides of the road. On the eastern side of the
lake, the area is bounded by a cross-section running from the outskirts of Kampong
Chhnang town northeast to National Road 6 (Fig. 1).
416 A. Salmivaara et al.

Banteay CAMBODIA
Meanchey
! Siem Reap

CHINA
!
Kampong
Thom
MYANMAR VIETNAM

LAOS
Battambang
!

THAILAND !

Pursat !

0 60 Km Kampong
0 500 Km
Chhnang

A B
Mekong Basin Province boundary
Province boundary National Road
Study villages
Country boundary Other villages
Mekong mainstream

C
Zone 1 (Lower Floodplain)
Zone 2 (Upper Floodplain)
Zone 3 (Urban)

Fig. 1 The Tonle Sap Lake area: Location of study area in regional scale (a), in local scale (b) and the
visualisation of the sub-zones (c). In Map C, the Zone 3 (Urban) is represented with circles scaled according to
the provincial urban population, as it consists of mainly the settlements located within and close to the
provincial capitals. Source: country boundaries (GADM 2009), Mekong basin boundary (USGS), Provincial
boundaries and illages (NIS 2008), topographic zones modified from Keskinen (2006)

Population Censuses

Two most recent Population Censuses from the years 1998 and 2008 (NIS 1998, 2000,
2008) were used to analyse the socio-economic status and trends in the Tonle Sap Lake
area. We extracted the selected socio-economic indicators (Tables S1, S2, S3 in the
Electronic supplementary material) from the raw Census data, and analysed their status
and change in two ways: in terms of quantities and in terms of proportion.
We consider this kind of analysis crucially important, as these two ways illustrate
complimentary and often the quite differing aspects of the same data. For example,
while the proportion of a certain sector from the total workforce describes the changes
in the significance of that sector, the examination of absolute quantities reveals the
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 417

changes in the actual number of people involved in the sector. Importantly, these two
can even indicate opposite trends due to population growth (e.g. Fig. 2).

Spatial Approach: Dividing Study Area into Spatial Zones

Our study area includes 1555 villages, and analysis of such an extensive dataset
therefore benefits from classification. While most socio-economic datasets categorise
the data based on administrative boundaries, we build our analysis also on the
topographic zoning developed for the area (Keskinen 2006). The reason was simple:
instead of administrative boundaries, water follows the landscape topography and a
categorisation based on the actual location thus facilitates the connection between the
socio-economy and the Tonle Sap Lake.
Based on the topographic zoning and the level of urbanisation – and supported by
statistical analysis (see below) – we divided the Tonle Sap area into three zones: Zone 1
(Lower Floodplain), Zone 2 (Upper Floodplain), and Zone 3 (Urban) (Fig. 1c). Zone 1
(Lower Floodplain) consists of the area and villages located closest to the lake, with the
topographic location between 0 and 6 m above mean sea level (amsl). This zone thus
experiences the most intensive flooding, with average maximum water depth ranging
from 3 to 7.6 m (Kummu et al. 2014). Zone 2 (Upper Floodplain) consists of the area
and villages in the upper floodplains, with a 3-km buffer beyond the National Roads
(>10 m amsl). This zone experiences less seasonal flooding than Zone 1 (Arias et al.
2012), enabling regular rice cultivation and other agricultural activities. The third zone,
Zone 3 (Urban), includes the urban settlements as defined in the Population Census
(NIS 1998, 2008). The settlements in Zone 3 are located main in the provincial capitals
as well as close to the National Roads, being higher in their topography and experienc-
ing little or no regular flooding.
These three zones have thus very different connections to the lake and its annual
flood pulse. The flood pulse has greatly impacted on the floodplain functions and
vegetation (Arias et al. 2013), and the flood characteristics have largely shaped the
traditional livelihoods in the area. The predicted future impacts of the Mekong hydro-
power development and climate change vary greatly across the floodplain (e.g.
Arias et al. 2012, 2014; Keskinen et al. 2013). Therefore, the zones will be
subject to very different changes in the physical environment in the future.
Overall, it is important to note that the three zones differ greatly in terms of
both population and area, with Zone 2 clearly having the biggest population
and Zone 1 being the largest area-wise (Table 1).
The three zones were further divided into altogether 18 sub-zones based on the
administrative boundaries of the six Tonle Sap provinces (NIS 2008). This was done to
allow more detailed analysis of the different zones within each province and to connect
the analysis with actual planning and management activities, commonly implemented
by provincial authorities.

Clustering Census Data for Comparison with Spatial Zones

While the three zones had clear differences in terms of their connection to the lake-
floodplain system, their definition is rather simplistic as the zone boundaries were
defined by topographic contour lines. Consequently, in order to assess the statistical
418 A. Salmivaara et al.

Fig. 2 The status (as of 2008) and changes in the quantity and share of the workforce in the selected sectors in„
18 sub-zones of the Tonle Sap area, based on data from Population Census (NIS 1998, 2008). a) Fishing: The
number of people (and the share of workforce) in 2008; b) Fishing: The change from 1998 in the quantity of
workforce; c) Fishing: The change from 1998 in the share of workforce as percentage points; d) Agriculture:
The number of people (and the share of workforce) in 2008; e) Agriculture: The change from 1998 in the
quantity of workforce; f) Agriculture: The change from 1998 in the share of workforce as percentage points; g)
Wholesale & retail trade: The number of people (and the share of workforce) in 2008; h) Wholesale & retail
trade: The change from 1998 in the quantity of workforce; i) Wholesale & retail trade: The change from 1998
in the share of workforce as percentage points

meaningfulness of the three spatial zones, we used a ‘data-driven’ k-means clustering

for the Population Census data.
The k-means clustering identifies relatively homogeneous groups of cases (villages/
settlements in this study) based on indicators included, using an iterative algorithm that
maximises the variance between clusters while minimising the variance within a
cluster. In the k-means procedure, the number of clusters is fixed at the beginning
and several numbers of clusters should therefore be tested. While the main aim is to
compare the spatial zones with data clusters, we also tested various numbers of clusters.
To examine the performance of the clustering, we used a silhouette coefficient
(Rousseeuw 1987) that measures how similar the village is to other villages in the
same cluster compared with other villages in the neighbouring cluster. We used the
MATLAB R2014a software to conduct the clustering based on squared Euclidean
distance for a set of indicators from the 2008 Population Census data (NIS 2008;
Table S3).
We started the cluster analysis with 23 indicators that were standardised (Eq. S1 in
Electronic supplementary material) and normalised (Eq. S2). We examined the corre-
lation of indicators (Table S3) and detected strongly correlating indicators, which were
then replaced with a linear combination of these indicators created with Principal
Component Analysis, PCA (Jolliffe 2002), conducted with IBM SPSS Statistics v20
software. The PCA sustains the variation and information of the indicators, while
reducing collinearity and increasing the efficiency of the indicators used in the k-means
clustering. We found 10 strongly correlating indicators (>0.5 correlation coefficient
between indicators; Table S3) that were replaced with one Principal Component, PC
(Table S4). This PC was considered as a combined urban indicator (BUrban PC^), since
most of the indicators of the PC had clearly differing values in the urban areas. As a
result, 14 indicators (13 indicators and 1 PC containing the information of the ten
correlating indicators) were used in the clustering analysis.

Results

Status Quo of Livelihoods and Demographics

The detailed examination of all 18 sub-zones reveals significant spatial and temporal
variation, for example, in the quantity and share of the workforce in different economic
sectors (Fig. 2a–i) and in population and education (Fig. 3a–b). In 2008, the main
economic activity sectors were ‘Agriculture, hunting and forestry’ (61 % of the total
workforce), ‘Wholesale and retail trade’ (11.5 %) and ‘Fishing’ (4.5 %) (Table S2).
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 419

Banteay Meanchey
(0.4%; 0.5%; 0.6%)
Siem Reap
(58.1%; 1.2%; 1.4%)

B) Change in quantity
Kampong Thom -499 - 0
(76.8%; 1.2%; 0.7%) 1 - 500
Battambang 501 - 2500
(85.6%; 1.5%; 0.3%) 2501 - 5000

Pursat
(67.5%;1.4%; 0.3%)

Kampong Chhnang
(43.2%; 2.2%; 12.0%)
A) People in Fishing in ‘08 C) Change in proportion
5 - 1000 % of total workforce of sub-zone -4.9 - 0.0 percentage point (%p)
1001 - 3500 Province i 0.1 - 5.0 %p
3501 - 7000 (Zone 1; Zone 2; Zone 3) 5.1 - 15 %p

Banteay Meanchey
(97%; 82%; 33%)
Siem Reap
(29%; 79%; 15%)

E) Change in quantity
Kampong Thom -499 - 0
1 - 500
(17%; 86%; 54%) 501 - 5000
Battambang
5001 - 35,000
(2%; 77%; 30%)

Pursat
(21%;85%; 38%)

Kampong Chhnang
D) People in agricultural sector in 08’ (44%; 81%; 18%) F) Change in proportion
0 - 25,000 -20 - -5 %p
% of total workforce of sub-zone -4.9 - 0 %p
25,001 - 75,000 Province i
75,001 - 125,000 0.1 - 5 %p
(Zone 1; Zone 2; Zone 3)
5.1 - 15 %p

Banteay Meanchey
(0.3%; 5%; 27%)
Siem Reap
(7%; 6%; 25%)

H) Change in quantity
Kampong Thom -2500 - -500
(4%; 5%; 16%) -499 - 0
Battambang 1 - 500
501 - 2500
(7%; 7%; 24%) 2501 - 25,000

Pursat
(7%;5%; 20%)

Kampong Chhnang
(7%; 5%; 28%)
G) People in Wholesale & retail trade in ‘08 I) Change in proportion
0 - 5000 % of total workforce of sub-zone -10 - -5 %p
5001 - 10,000 Province i -4.9 - 0 %p
10,001 - 25,000 (Zone 1; Zone 2; Zone 3) 0.1 - 5 %p
420 A. Salmivaara et al.

Table 1 Zone characteristics. (Source: surface area calculated in ArcGIS, others from Census 2008)

Area [km2] % of total area Villages/settlements Population % total

population

Zone 1 (lower floodplain) 8531a 52 % 86 84,490 5%

Zone 2 (upper floodplain) 7649 46 % 1158 1,028,970 60 %
Zone 3 (Urban) 311b 2% 311 593,630 35 %
TOTAL 16,491 100 % 1555 1,707,090 100 %

a
includes the lake proper
b
estimation based on 1 km2 average settlement size

Other remarkable and rapidly growing sectors include ‘Construction’ (3.7 %), ‘Trans-
port, storage and communication’ (3.5 %) and ‘Manufacturing’ (3.4 %).
The spatial patterns for fishing (Fig. 2a–c) and agricultural activities (Fig. 2d–f) are
particularly interesting. In Zone 1, for example, the changes in the proportion of fishing
varied remarkably, with a decreasing trend in Siem Reap and Kampong Thom and an

A) Change in population from 98’

-2,000 - 0 Banteay Meanchey
+1 - 20,000 (2.3; 140.1; 79.3)
Siem Reap
+20,000 - 100,000
(21.9; 259.5; 191.8)
Population in 08’ (in thousands)
Province i
(Zone 1; Zone 2; Zone 3)
Kampong Thom
(9.0; 133.5; 54.0)
Battambang
(14.7; 239.2; 186.2)

Pursat
(15.0; 177.0; 42.2)

Kampong Chhnang
(21.6; 79.8; 40.1)

B) Change in percentage points (%p) of population NOT completed primary school from 98’
-10 - -5 %p Banteay Meanchey
-4.9 - -0 %p (60%; 41%; 28%)
+0.1 - +5 %p Siem Reap
(48%; 39%; 25%)
% of population NOT completed
primary school in 08’
Province i
(Zone 1; Zone 2; Zone 3) Kampong Thom
(35%; 38%; 24%)
Battambang
(38%; 36%; 24%)

Pursat
(31%; 36%; 24%)

Kampong Chhnang
(37%; 35%; 22%)
Fig. 3 The change in population (a), primary school completion (b) in the Tonle Sap area
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 421

increasing trend in Kampong Chhnang and particularly in Battambang (with a 14 %-

point increase from 1998 to 2008). Quantitatively, however, the people engaged in
fishing increased the most in Siem Reap Zone 1.
The role of agricultural activities increased in areas where fishing is the most
common sector (e.g. Pursat Zone 1), but decreased in almost all other areas. Quanti-
tatively, however, the agricultural sector grew between 1998 and 2008 in all sub-areas
except for the sub-zones 1 of Battambang and Kampong Chhnang where fishing
increased its role.
This analysis of the Census data also shows that the provincial capital of Siem Reap
is clearly leading the tertiarisation process, meaning the change from primary sectors
towards a variety of trade and service-related activities (Fig. 2g–i). This is largely a
result of the rapid increase in tourism to the adjacent Angkor temples (Gaughan et al.
2009), which has increased the need for construction, trade and service and as a result
pulled remarkable amount of migrants to Siem Reap work in these sectors (e.g.
Table S2: ‘Hotels and restaurants’ and ‘Construction’ sectors). The strength of this
‘urban pull factor’ can be estimated to be very strong, as the population in Siem Reap
area almost doubled over 10 years (Fig. 3a). While the town of Battambang is also a
centre for many economic and industrial activities (Ishikawa 2009), its population
increased during the same period only by 7100 people.
Education level – measured in our analysis as the proportion of population
having completed at least primary school – has a crucial role for future socio-
economic development. While the level has been generally slowly improving
(being the highest in urban areas), the spatially more detailed analysis also
revealed stagnating trends in Zone 1, indicating increasing disparity between the
three zones (Fig. 3b).

Main Trends in Demographics and Economic Structure

Our analysis indicates that the Tonle Sap area is changing both socially and econom-
ically, but the pace varies notably across the area. The analysis of the population age
structure (population organized by 5-year age groups) reveals a key demographic trend
that, we argue, will have a major influence on the future development of the entire
Tonle Sap area. As can be seen from Fig. 4a, the two teenager groups of 10–14 and 15–
19 years (as of 2008) are very clearly the largest age cohorts in the area. Such a ‘youth
wave’ indicates a remarkable and already on-going pressure on the labour market, as
these young age groups search for meaningful livelihood opportunities in both urban
and rural areas.
Kuznets’ theory on economic growth and structural transformations (Kuznets 1966)
provides one way to look at the differences in the general livelihood structure of the
three zones. Based on the theory, we grouped the Census’ economic activities into three
sectors: primary sector (‘Fishing’, ‘Agriculture, hunting and forestry’), secondary
sector (‘Manufacturing’, ‘Mining’, ‘Construction’, ‘Water & electricity supply’) and
tertiary sector (the rest of the categories, including e.g. services, trade, transport and
communication) (Table S1). As can be seen from Fig. 4b, Zones 1 and 2 have clearly
distinguishable main economic activity (fishing and agriculture, respectively), while the
economic structure in the Zone 3 (Urban) is more mixed with a majority of the
workforce being engaged in the tertiary sector.
422 A. Salmivaara et al.

A) Age groups 240

1998 Tonle Sap
2008 220

1998 200
2008 Zone 2 (Upper Floodplain)
180
1998 Zone 3 (Urban)
2008 160
1998 140

Number of people (in thousands)

Zone 1 (Lower Floodplain)
2008
120

100

80

60
40

20

0
0 - 4
5 - 9

15 - 19

30 - 34
10 - 14

20 - 24
25 - 29

35 - 39
40 - 44
45 - 49
50 - 54
55 - 59
60 - 64
65 - 69
70 - 74
75 -
Age group

B) Main economic activity structure

100% 98’ 08’
QUANTITY (in thousands)
(Urban)
Zone 3

tertiary sectors
SHARE

secondary sectors
agriculture, hunting
and forestry
(Lower Floodplain) (Upper Floodplain)

0% fishing
100%
Zone 2

0%
100%
Zone 1

0%
100

200

300

400
300

200

100

Number of people (in thousands)

Fig. 4 a) The change in age structure per zone in the Tonle Sap area. The effect of the tragic Khmer Rouge
regime in 1975–79 is clearly visible in the smaller cohorts of 20–24 year olds in the 1998 Census data and of
30–34 year olds in the 2008 Census data. b) The general structure of main economic activities per zone. The
amount of the workforce in different sectors is presented horizontally (1998 on the left-hand side and 2008 on
the right hand side). The proportion of workforce in different sectors in 1998 and 2008 is visible vertically: the
thicker the column, the bigger its proportion from total workforce. The full description of the sectors and their
grouping are presented in Table S1 of the Electronic supplementary material
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 423

Given the importance of fish for the Cambodian food security and the expected
negative impacts on the Tonle Sap fisheries due to Mekong hydropower development,
we paid special attention to the fishing sector. The proportion of people involved in the
fishing sector has decreased slightly, from 4.7 % in 1998 to 4.5 % in 2008 (Table S2,
Fig. 2b). Due to population growth (Fig. 4a), however, the absolute number of people
having fishing as the main economic activity increased by 10,700 between 1998 and
2008 (Fig. 2b). Furthermore, the Tonle Sap area hosts an increasing proportion of
Cambodian fishing sector: in terms of workforce, 42 % of the 2008 Cambodian fishing
sector was located in the Tonle Sap area with remarkable additional fishing taking place
along the Tonle Sap River that was excluded from this analysis. This major share
naturally emphasises the importance of the Tonle Sap system for Cambodia’s fishing
sector and its role for both employment and food security.
The proportion of the workforce engaged in the ‘Agricultural, hunting and forestry’
sector (great majority of which is agriculture) decreased from 66 % in 1998 to 61 % in
2008 (Table S2, Fig. 2b), following the national trend. Yet, due to population growth
(Fig. 3a), the amount of the workforce in the agricultural sector increased remarkably
by 130,000 people (Fig. 4b), indicating additional pressure on agricultural land and
related resources.
Our analysis shows that tertiary sector is becoming increasingly important in the
urban zone, with the total number of people working in the sector increasing from less
than 100,000 to over 150,000. In Zone 3, the primary sectors hold up only a third of the
workforce, while the tertiary and secondary sectors have increased their proportion to
66 % of the workforce. In Zone 1, on the other hand, the proportion of the workforce
within secondary and tertiary sectors decreased having less than 10 % share in 2008.

Discussion

This study provided information on the demographic and socio-economic status and
key trends in the Tonle Sap area, analysed and visualised spatially in relation to both
administrational and topographical boundaries across the lake-floodplain system. To
our knowledge, this was the first time that such trend analysis of the Census data was
carried out in the area, and our study therefore enhanced the understanding of major
socio-economic trends in the Tonle Sap area and their zonal patterns.

Comparing Statistical Clusters and Spatial Zones

Methodologically, our most important results were related to finding the optimal zoning
for reporting the census results. First phase for this aim required testing the robustness
of the topographical zones, for which we used k-means clustering. We compared the
distribution of villages into spatial zones and into k-means clusters, and examined the
similarity of the cluster centres and average indicator values of spatial zones with
Levene’s test.
When more than three clusters were used, the additional clusters did not bring up
different patterns but mainly added hierarchy within the three main clusters (Fig. S1A
& S1B). The silhouette coefficient plots show that when the number of clusters is
higher than three, the silhouette coefficients decrease i.e. clustering is not better. In
424 A. Salmivaara et al.

addition, it is evident that the fishing villages, urban villages and majority of agricul-
tural villages form their own specific cluster in each clustering. Thus, for the purpose of
our analysis, the statistical clustering to three groups reveals a similar pattern as what is
drawn with the spatial zoning.
As the case order influences the clustering result (Wang et al. 2010), we shuffled the
order of data entries 10,000 times and conducted clustering for these random case
orders. Clear majority (75.6 %) of these produced the cluster centres that are presented
in Table S5 (differing cluster centres presented in Fig. S2). The clustering was also
conducted for two random sub-sets of the original data, and in this case 95 % of the
villages were clustered similarly when compared with the clustering conducted for the
whole dataset.
When comparing the three statistical clusters with the three spatial zones, the
average indicator values calculated for spatial zones and for clusters (i.e. the cluster
centres) were generally very close to each other (Table S5). This indicates that the three
spatial zones are also statistically meaningful. In cases where they differed statistically,
the k-means clustering distinguished the villages/settlements more strictly based on
their main economic activity. Differences are described in detail in Fig S3 and Table S6.
This comparison confirmed that the decision of using three spatial zones was statisti-
cally valid and that the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the popu-
lation are indeed spatially clustered to three clusters following roughly the physical
geography of the area.
The k-means clustering worked as supporting method that strengthened our under-
standing about the strong relationship between socio-economy and topography. This
method has the ability to find unknown patterns, but the interpretation may sometimes
require extensive studies. Future studies should include also clustering indicators on
change, particularly after next Population Census data becomes available.

Spatial Approach and Optimal Unit of Analysis

The developed spatial approach reduced the gap between physical environment and
socio-economics by utilising a spatial approach, as villages were analysed based on
their location rather than considering administrative boundaries only (Birkin and Clarke
2009). Our approach facilitated the data integration needs of environmental impact
assessments, as spatially referenced information on possible environmental changes can
be overlaid with quantitative and spatially explicit demographic and socio-economic
data. While this does not directly enable translating e.g. hydrological impacts into
socio-economic changes, the presentation of the data in the same spatial platform and
with the same unit of analysis enables further elaboration of the most relevant issues
and impacts.
The developed spatial approach brought several benefits to the categorisation,
analysis and visualisation of the extensive demographic and socio-economic
data used. Most importantly, the approach revealed statistically relevant linkages
between several socio-economic indicators and geography, and hence with the
hydrology of the lake-floodplain system. The approach can also be used to
ensure a comprehensive spatial representation of a more qualitative household
survey, as was actually done for the Tonle Sap Household Survey (Ward and
Poutsma 2013). The adopted approach worked particularly well in our lake-
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 425

floodplain study area with its bowl-like topography, but we believe it could be
applied in similar areas elsewhere as well.
Dividing the three zones further into 18 sub-zones based on administrative bound-
aries was equally important to emphasise the differences in the demographic and socio-
economic settings within the zones (see Figs. 2 and 5). The approach enabled exam-
ining the data simultaneously at various levels (e.g. by zones, sub-zones and prov-
inces). This brought out, for example, the special role that Siem Reap has for the entire
Tonle Sap area as well as the differences in the economic trends in Zone 1. The
importance of sub-zones in sustaining spatial detail is strengthened when comparing
our results with those of Keskinen (2006), where only topographic zones were used,
neglecting thus the diversity within each zone (Fig. 5) and disabling connections to
planning and management units.
These findings also make the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem visible indicat-
ing that the results may be significantly different when using a varying spatial
unit of analysis and/or scale (Séguin et al. 2012; Jelinski and Wu 1996;
Fotheringham and Wong 1991). In this study, we harnessed the phenomenon
to find the optimal unit of analysis. Considering spatial, administrative and data
characteristics in defining the unit of analysis results in a rather robust analysis
unit and thus MAUP is less of a problem.

A) Wholesale & retail trade: Change in quantity 98’-08’

Topographical zoning Topographical zoning with administrational boundaries

-2,000 - -500
-499 - 0
1 - 500
501 - 2,500
2,501 - 25,000

B) Fishing: Change in percentage points (%p) of workforce 98’-08’

Administrational boundaries Topographical zoning with administrational boundaries

-2.7- -2.0 %p
-1.9 - 0.0 %p
0.1 - 2.0 %p
2.1 - 10 %p
10.1 - 15 %p

Fig. 5 Example of the advantage from combining spatial zones with administrative boundaries compared
with a zoning based only on topography and urbanisation (a) or only on administrative boundaries (b),
generally relating to the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem
426 A. Salmivaara et al.

Overall, our study highlights how spatial analysis can help planning and decision-
making by bridging the gaps between socio-economic data and physical geography
(e.g. del Campo 2012; Huby et al. 2007; Martinuzzi et al. 2007; Radeloff et al. 2000;
Walker and Young 1997).

Demographic and Socio-Economic Drivers and Their Policy Implications

Understanding the linkages between socio-economic data and geography lays a foun-
dation for the assessments on impacts that future hydrological changes may cause to the
people and their livelihoods. The links between socio-economics, hydrology and land
cover have been studied also in the Tonle Sap for example in the project that this study
contributed to (Keskinen et al. 2013) as well as in several other impact assessment
processes (e.g. Arias et al. 2012, 2014; Heinonen 2009; Holtgrieve et al. 2013;
Kubiszewski et al. 2013; Kummu et al. 2006; MRCS/WUP-FIN 2008; Orr et al.
2012; Ziv et al. 2012). Overall, the assessments suggest that the Mekong hydropower
development pose a severe threat to the Tonle Sap ecosystem, fisheries and the related
livelihoods (Arias et al. 2014; Keskinen et al. 2010), indicating that the potential
hydropower development at regional level must be considered in national
development strategies.
At the same time, most existing assessments focus on external drivers, paying much
less attention to internal drivers – such as demographic shifts – within the Tonle Sap
Lake area. Our analysis filled large part of this research gap, as it captured the general
demographic and socio-economic trends in the area based on spatial analysis of two
most recent Population Censuses. Comparison of our results with other studies
confirms that similar structures have been found in the study area. For example,
the extensive Tonle Sap Household Survey (Ward and Poutsma 2013) conclud-
ed with economic activity structure alike the one in our study: more than 60 %
of the respondent households had agriculture as their main livelihood activity,
with trade (18.5 %) the second and fishing (6 %) the third most important
source of livelihood.
The primary sectors of agriculture and fishing thus dominate very clearly in the
Tonle Sap area, forming the foundation for both food security and livelihoods partic-
ularly in the rural areas. When considering the low urbanization rate and its rather
moderate projections for Cambodia (Jones 2013), it seems clear that also the future
workforce structure will be dominated by these primary sectors. At the same time, the
striking differences between the development in urban and rural areas are already
visible in the Tonle Sap area, with stagnating areas closest to the lake and the most
dynamic areas in urban Zone 3.
The existing economic structures will, however, be exposed to an increasing pres-
sure from the large young age cohorts that are entering the workforce at this very
moment. In this way, the entire Cambodia makes a special case, as the median age of
Cambodian population is among the youngest in Southeast Asia (Jones 2013) and
around half of the Cambodian population is 25 years old or younger (UN DESA 2013).
This makes Cambodia different from its neighbours, for its current population age
structure is somewhat similar to for example that of Thailand in 1990 (Jones 2013).
Such a youth wave presents, however, not only a challenge but also a remarkable
opportunity, as the rising proportion of working age people can through the
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 427

demographic dividend lead to increased development, if backed up by supporting

policies and enabling environment (Bloom et al. 2003; Jones 2013).
Such findings send therefore a strong message to Cambodia’s national strategic
development plans (RGC 2010, 2013). First of all, it is obvious that the Tonle Sap area
– and entire country – will see increasing changes and pressures within the next 5–
10 years when the large young age cohorts enter the workforce, searching for mean-
ingful livelihood opportunities. Our findings indicate that the development plans should
in the rural areas focus on strengthening the existing livelihood base, with emphasis on
sustainable agricultural development and diversification. The success of the recent
fisheries reform (MRC 2012) is also critical for strengthening both livelihoods and
food security. In more urbanised areas – including provincial cities and district towns –
the livelihood diversification will be much more rapid, although there are likely to
occur major differences in the pace of development around the area (Keskinen
et al. 2013).

Limitations and Ways Forward

Incorporating livelihood issues into impact assessments and development plans re-
quires extensive and accurate information on socio-economic situation. Our results are
based on Cambodian national Census, and its features and limitations require attention
when interpreting and using our findings. While the censuses thus Binfluence policy for
years to come^ (United Nations 2009), they are criticised for their biases, including
their inability to fully represent the dynamic nature of the socio-economic issues (Gill
1993; United Nations 2010).
Overall, the Census data seem to be more reliable in less diverse demographic
indicators, while in the case of economic activities there are some challenges. Perhaps
the biggest problem is that the Census focuses on the main economic activities,
meaning that people are largely defined by their main economic activity only. Yet, in
reality most people’s livelihoods in the Tonle Sap area consist of potpourri of overlap-
ping and seasonally differing livelihood activities (e.g. Evans et al. 2004; Hall and
Bouapao 2010; Heinonen 2009; Keskinen 2006; Ward and Poutsma 2013). This means
that for example the role of fishing – that is often also important secondary activity – is
likely to be underreported in the Census data.
In the case of Tonle Sap, the Cambodian national Census is criticised for not
representing the dynamics of livelihoods and particularly undermining the role of
fishing (Keskinen 2006). This undermining can be enforced when using only admin-
istrative unit of analysis that somewhat neglects the role of the location in influencing
the socio-economic structure. As a practical way forward, we therefore suggest that the
Population Censuses should consider much better the seasonality and diversity of
economic activities in both rural and urban areas. This would not be a big task, as
the majority of such variation could be captured with only a couple of additional
questions focusing on actual livelihood sources at different seasons. For studies and
analyses such as ours, it is also imperative to compare the results from quantitative data
analysis with more focused studies such as village and/or household surveys (which we
did in the broader research project; see Keskinen et al. 2013).
A spatial approach has its limitations, too, as all the information needed for
comprehensive analysis is practically never fully spatially referenced. Also the
428 A. Salmivaara et al.

approach is, similarly to other data-driven methods, heavily dependent on data avail-
ability and quality: the assessment can only be as good as the available data. The
dynamics and complexity of the human-ecosystem linkages and the inability of datasets
to record these pose a major challenge for assessments. Furthermore, while the spatial
heterogeneity can usually be recognised and addressed (de Lange et al. 2010) and
examined through remote sensing for environmental data, no similar technology exists
by now for population patterns. To go around these challenges, we see that it is
important to use a variety of different datasets, and to describe in transparent manner
the limitations and challenges related to the data and the analysis methods used.

Conclusions

This article analysed the demographic and socio-economic status quo and key trends in
the Tonle Sap Lake area through a spatial approach, facilitating the linkage to the
physical characteristics of the unique lake-floodplain system. Such an analysis is
particularly timely given the expected negative impacts that the on-going Mekong
hydropower development is likely to cause to the Tonle Sap system.
The key demographic trend in the area is caused by the dominance of younger age
cohorts, which will have a major influence on the future development of the area. The
economic activity structure changed only modestly between 1998 and 2008, with a
great majority of people remaining dependent on agriculture and fishing. We found this
kind of stability somewhat surprising, particularly when considering the simultaneous
demographic changes and relatively rapid development in the urban areas and Siem
Reap in particular. At the same time, our analysis showed how unevenly the different
areas have been developing, with remarkable variation both within and between the
three spatial zones.
In terms of policy-making, we suggest that the spatial differences related to both
demographic and socio-economic trends should be considered much more carefully
than is presently done. For the current planning system builds largely on national
development plans, and seems to consider the Tonle Sap and its six provinces as rather
homogeneous area. It is also critical that the demographic and socio-economic trends
are considered together with the expected impacts of the Mekong hydropower devel-
opment. Yet, our analysis indicates that even without such hydropower development,
the Tonle Sap will face major socio-economic challenges that require a swift policy
response. We think that the rectangular strategy of the Royal Government of Cambodia
(RGC 2010, 2013) has all the necessary policies in place for such response to take
place; the question is, however, how such policies can actually be implemented in a
coordinated and effective way.
Our article emphasises the importance of looking at different sectors as well as both
external and internal drivers of change simultaneously when carrying out environmen-
tal impact assessments. The spatial approach was used to find an optimal unit of
analysis for linking socio-economic data with the Tonle Sap’s unique hydrology, related
ecosystems and physical environment. Using spatial zones instead of more conven-
tional administrative boundaries created a different way of viewing and analysing the
Tonle Sap area, with more direct linkages to the geography. Changing water levels or
ecosystem productivity drivers can now be examined in the same platform. As such,
Socio-Economic Changes in Cambodia’s Unique Tonle Sap Lake Area 429

our approach contributes to the discussion about the spatial analysis and integration of
different types of data used in impact assessments.
When considering vulnerability and impact assessments more generally, spatial
approaches utilising quantitative data have their challenges as well. Our experience
indicates that such challenges are particularly related to the complex socio-economic
dynamics and their (under)representation in available datasets. It is also important to
transparently describe the impact of the chosen spatial unit of analysis to the analysis
results. At the same time, the spatial approach facilitates data integration and it can as
such be helpful in visualising - and even filling - the gaps in our existing knowledge.

Acknowledgments Our analysis forms a part of 2-year ‘Exploring Tonle Sap Futures’ (ETSF) project
(http://bit.ly/YifGN5) that looked at the interconnections between hydrology and livelihoods in the context of
water-energy-food-climate nexus. The project formed one case study for a regional, CSIRO-led ‘Exploring
Mekong Region Futures’ program. The ETSF project was implemented by a research consortium consisting of
Aalto University, 100Gen Ltd., Hatfield Consultants Partnership and Institute of Technology of Cambodia,
complemented with the work by EIA Ltd. and VU University Amsterdam. The governmental partners of the
project were the Tonle Sap Authority (TSA) and the Supreme National Economic Council (SNEC) (Keskinen
et al. 2013; Smajgl et al. 2011). The authors would like to thank all the colleagues who contributed to our
work, in particular Pech Sokhem, Someth Paradis, John Ward and Alex Smajgl as well as H.E. So Sophort and
Tony Hell from TSA. Thank you also to our other wonderful colleagues at Aalto University’s Water &
Development Research Group. Finally we are very thankful for the anonymous reviewers who invested time
and effort in the review that contributed to improving our manuscript enormously.
In addition to the ETSF project funding, AS received funding from the VALUE Doctoral School and Aalto
University Fund, MKu from post-doctoral funds of Aalto University, and MKe & AS from Academy of
Finland project 133748.

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