Angelina Jolie’s ties to Cambodia go back more than two decades, and the project she started there has grown far beyond its first mission.
It began with landmines
In 2003, Jolie launched the work that became the Maddox Foundation, named after her son Maddox, who was born in Cambodia. Its early focus was rural communities in north-west Cambodia scarred by decades of conflict with neighbouring Thailand, and clearing landmines was one of its priorities.
As that threat eased, the foundation widened its work to conservation, education, healthcare and sustainable livelihoods.
A forest 1,500 times bigger than her land
Jolie bought a house with about 39 hectares of land in Battambang province. The forest the foundation now helps protect is vastly larger: the Samlout Multiple Use Area covers about 60,994 hectares across Battambang and Pailin provinces, near the Thai border.
Jolie does not own that forest. The foundation has worked with Cambodian authorities and local communities on its conservation since 2006, when it began training and employing local residents as forest rangers to patrol against illegal logging and poaching.
What the rangers protect
Threatened species in the area include the Asian elephant, Sunda pangolin, dhole, Asian black bear and gaur. A camera-trap survey by the conservation charity Fauna & Flora and Cambodia’s Ministry of Environment, funded by the foundation, recorded numerous mammal and bird species.
Patrols removed about 7,800 metres of wire snares during 2025, according to the report.
Beyond conservation
The foundation also runs programmes in sustainable farming, reforestation and beekeeping. Beekeepers taking part produced 1,392 litres of honey in 2025.
Further reading
Image: Angelina Jolie at Davos2 by World Economic Forum from Cologny, Switzerland, BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
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