A mine-clearance program that uses rodents to detect
remnants of war buried in the earth has cleared its first minefield in
Cambodia, meaning villagers will now be able to safely farm the area. Apopo, a
Belgian NGO that runs the HeroRats program, announced early Saturday that
89,280 square meters of land were cleared, “making the land safe for families
to resettle and utilize the land for agriculture once again”.
Cambodia is one of the most
mine-contaminated countries in the world. According to the Cambodian Mine
Action Centre (CMAC), an estimated 2,000 square kilometers (772 square miles)
of land are affected by ordnance.
Apopo has pioneered the use of
giant pouched rats -- an intelligent rodent that is both light of foot with a
keen sense of smell -- trained to detect the scent of explosive material.
They are then harnessed up and
deployed to sniff the ground in small grid sections. If they think they’ve come
across something suspicious underground, they scratch at the ground, which
signals their handler to investigate further with metal detectors.
Apopo quoted local resident and
landmine survivor Seany Oeurn as saying that her eldest daughter was “shocked
to hear that the landmines are still present in the field where I was injured.
She believed that once the landmines are old then they become inactive."
"We were even more surprised
when APOPO and CMAC found two active mines there the previous week. Now my
family are finally safe,” she added.
CMAC director-general Heng Ratana
told Anadolu Agency on Saturday that while the HeroRAT program was still in the
operational trial phase, “we can say that it’s a remarkable success of the
integration trial.”
“The rats are… able to identify
landmines in the real minefields and that is a remarkable success of the
detection system of rats to help our deminers find the landmines,” he said.
The field in question is located in
Siem Reap province, and Ratana said more than 10 mines and other unexploded
ordnance was cleared by the Apopo and CMAC teams.
The rat program is still in its
trial phase, he said, but once wrapped up, it will be integrated into the
country’s standard operating procedures for mine clearance.
The first HeroRATS arrived in
Cambodia in April 2015.
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