Another garment factory within the International Labour Organisation’s Better Factories program was hit by a mass fainting incident yesterday.  More than 50 employees of Heart Enterprise (Cambodia) Co Ltd began collapsing soon after starting their shift at the facility, in Phnom Penh’s Dangkor district. An ...

After 28 years in the capital, eating like “a king” and enjoying the perks one receives as the son of high-ranking CPP officials, Sophal’s* move to the countryside was as jarring as it was eye-opening. Until the day in June when he traded his designer threads ...

SAMRAONG TONG DISTRICT, Kompong Speu Province – Laughing, Ouch Samnang jumped back and forth over a skipping rope held by his classmates. The 13-year-old goes to school in a small village in Kom­pong Speu province, he has friends, five siblings and loving parents. Overall, he ...

When 46-year-old Than Thol got a $900 loan from Samic Microfinance last year, he took advantage of a little-known and  lengthily worded insurance program called Measure for Economic and Accelerated Development for All, or MEADA. MEADA provides coverage for families of mostly lower-income borrowers in the ...

The deaths of at least two Cambodian workers and injuries sustained by 10 colleagues at a shoe factory southwest of Phnom Penh once more shine a light on conditions in the global garment manufacturing industry. Thursday’s accident at the Wing Star Shoe factory in the Cambodian ...

A would-be tripartite workshop intended to improve the garment sector’s minimum wage setting process closed Friday, with the industry’s most influential player, the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC), boycotting the talks at Phnom Penh Hotel. The two-day workshop would have been the first meeting between ...

A technical error caused 57 teachers in Oddar Meanchey province to be shortchanged when collecting overtime salaries, said an education official who promised the problem will be rectified by the end of May. A teachers’ union on Monday asked the Ministry of Education to address some ...

Cambodia’s economic growth has been on the rise following the global downturn on 2008-2009 and experts say that the private sector is largely responsible for that growth. However, those same experts also acknowledge that the profits generated by companies operating in Cambodia aren’t trickling down ...

The Finance Ministry has approved a budget for the Education, Youth and Sport Ministry to spend on computers and printers for public schools. Finance Minister Aun Pornoniroth in a letter on Friday said the budget is to facilitate a part of the Education Ministry’s reform ...

The number of Cambodian women now thought to be caught in Saudi Arabia’s sex industry after being trafficked in the past year has risen to more than 20, officials said on Wednesday. However, the government remained tight-lipped about its efforts to rescue the women, while two ...

Since the government began its crackdown nearly one year and a half ago on foreigners without work permits, it has seen applications for work permits skyrocket alongside revenues from fines. ...

Ahead of today’s Ministry of Labour announcement of a minimum wage increase for Cambodia’s apparel sector, opposition leader Sam Rainsy yesterday urged striking workers in Svay Rieng province to hold out until their monthly salary is raised to $160. “[Garment] workers should not return to work ...

The unions behind several days of strikes that turned deadly this month said they will officially ask the Labor Ministry today to resume negotiations on a new minimum wage for the country’s critical garment sector, and said they would hold more street protests if their ...

The Ministry of Labour has ordered management at a Kandal province garment factory to clean their workroom and limit employees’ overtime hours, in response to over 100 workers fainting over two days. During a visit to King First Industrial Co, Ltd’s Kandal location yesterday, Seng Sakada, ...

A small gathering to mark World Teachers’ Day at Phnom Penh’s Freedom Park briefly descended into chaos Sunday when a crowd of rally-goers wrested a concealed gun from a man working for the Ministry of Information after he forced his way to the front of ...

A union official at the center of a strike that started last Monday and involves an estimated 30,000 workers from two special economic zones (SEZs) in Svay Rieng province said Sunday that he has no control over the strikers, and does not know when or ...

Amid complaints from union and labour rights officials of illegal firings over the years, Cambodia’s garment factory association is holding a course on the termination process in Preah Sihanouk province today. ...

The number of workers fainting in garment and footwear factories halved in 2013, a National Social Security Fund (NSSF) report released last week claims – a decline the Ministry of Labour puts down to increased education. The NSSF, which is part of the ministry, recorded 823 ...

The Ministry of Labour has announced that factory managers must allow employees three days off for Khmer New Year, even as some union leaders encourage workers to extend that time. In a letter to factory owners dated March 25, Labour Minister Ith Sam Heng reminds owners ...

About 200 garment workers marched from Phnom Penh’s Wincam garment factory to the Ministry of Labor on Thursday to press their demands for short-term contracts and better benefits. The Korean-owned factory’s 800-plus workers have been protesting since June 11 to demand that the factory change their ...