Landmines in Cambodia: Past, Present, and Future By Wade C. Rober ...

identity), has implemented one of Bottomley’s suggestions.⁵ Specifically, Company A offers financial incentives when people discover landmine-related ordnance. Villagers are informed that when they find landmines/UXO, Company A will quickly acquire the ordnance and compensate the villager according to the weight of the parcel. While this practice ultimately increases the rate at which people search for landmines/UXO, rates of incident occurrence have actually been dramatically reduced since its implementation.

Bottomley’s work makes an important contribution to Mine Action in Cambodia in that it broadly distinguishes between two types of landmine/UXO incidents: those that occur as a result of intentional engagement and those that do not. This connection was made at a critical time in Cambodia, considering that tampering incidents comprised the majority of incidents post–1999. While the linkage between incentives and tampering activity is suggested in her work, the relationship is never quantifiably verified. Accordingly, her analysis, which attempts to correlate the intentional engagement with ordnance to a reality of economic incentives, is mere conjecture. My research and quantitative analysis help to further this work.

1.5.3. Keeley (2006)

The primary concentration of the mine action community in Cambodia has been directed at mine clearance. In addition to mine clearance, Mine Action also confronts ordnance issues from perspectives of mine-risk education, stockpile destruction, victim assistance, and advocacy. Funding for these initiatives has never been sufficient and is likely to remain at levels lower than desired by the Mine Action community. Initiatives to combat landmine/UXO issues in Cambodia, while delineated into various projects, were not initially developed from an economic perspective.

Robert Keeley recognized that Mine Action was operating principally outside an economic paradigm. In fact, established prerogatives were put in place that made it difficult to operate according to economic concepts of efficiency. More precisely, the Ottawa Convention allows countries to seek an extension of clearance deadlines but does not allow countries