In Svay Rieng province villagers are in their fourth day of protests after authorities refused to meet with them to discuss a land concession that Metapheap Company has received in order to open a rubber plantation. The company was granted a 1,230 hectare land concession ...

A joint venture between Yayasan Restu, a Malaysian organization, and the Cambodian Muslim Development Foundation is set to establish a microfinance institution with $1 million in start-up capital. The institution will allow members of Cambodia’s Myslim community to obtain loans necessary to start small businesses. ...

Ratings agency Moody’s changed its outlook on Acleda Bank’s financial strength yesterday to “negative” from “stable” and downgraded its rating of the bank’s local currency deposits to Ba2 from Ba1. The rating downgrade was applied due to changes in shareholders at the bank over the ...

Trade between Cambodia and Vietnam surpassed a US$2 billion trade target for 2011 in just the first nine months of the year, according to the Vietnam Trade Office in Phnom Penh. Trade between the two countries hit the higher-than-projected $2.07 billion in September, up from about ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has called on microfinance institutions to reduce interest rates and expand repayment periods for the tens of thousands of families affected by last year’s devastating floods. Addressing microfinance institutions (MFIs) on Tuesday during a conference at the Ministry of Rural Development, ...

THE supply of pharmaceutical products has outstripped demand, causing a decrease in the value of drug imports during the first half of 2011, experts say. An increase in the number of firms importing pharmaceutical products in 2010 led to this year’s drop, Medical Trust Company ...

About 60 villagers from Battambang province’s Sampov Loun district gathered in Phnom Penh’s Wat Botum Park yesterday to prtotested against a 4,065-hectare land concession granted to a company for agriculture development. Korng Sokheng, a representative for 1,850 families, said villagers submitted a petition to Prime ...

Tensions with Thailand led to a 10-percent decline in imports from ASEAN members during the first six months of 2011, though Cambodia’s exports to the bloc nearly doubled, according to officials. Cambodia imported US$810.9 million during the six-month period compared to $904.9 million during the period ...

Fueled by a rise in food prices, inflation reached 7.1 percent in July compared to the same month last year, according to data released by the National Institute of Statistics According to the data, the price of meat increased by 16.4 percent in July compared to ...

Cambodia needs at least another $120 million of investment in rice mills if it is to meet the government’s 2015 target of exporting 1 million tons of rice, Agriculture Minister Chan Sarun said yesterday. While rice exports from Cambodia this year have seen a significant increase ...

The government said yesterday that a gold mine in Kompong Cham province that has damaged about 1 square km of land with chemical waste would cost at least $4 million to clean up. Speaking at a workshop in Phnom Penh on revenue transparency, Sim Sisokhaly, director ...

A Thai energy firm has completed a study for a 1,800-megawatt coal power plant in Koh Kong province, and had asked for Prime Minister Hun Sen’s support in furthering the project, government officials confirmed yesterday. The plant would be the largest power generator in the energy-starved ...

More than 200 families in Prey Veng province protested outside the Pea Reang district police office on Wednesday against electricity providers Elisa Hour and Electricite du Cambodge (EdC), which have both refused to lower electricity rates, despite having made a promise to do so three ...

Net profits at Acleda Bank increased by 86% to $49.4 million in 2011 as the company grew both its deposits and loan portfolio. In a statement released on Friday, Acleda said that loans grew by 35.4 percent to $989.4 million, while deposits at the bank ...

Participants at the Asean Peoples’ Forum have called on regional leaders to halt plans to construct two controversial hydropower dams in Laos and Cambodia because of the large number of people who will be affected and the lack of public consultation. The forum in Phnom Penh, ...

Approximately 65 percent of the country’s 3,492 registered international and local NGOs are inactive, leaving only about 1,350 active NGOs in the country, according to a report issued yesterday by NGO network Cooperation Committee for Cambodia (CCC). The report, “CSO Contributions to the Development of Cambodia ...

Cambodia cassava exports to Thailand resumed yesterday along the Banteay Meanchey province border after Thai commerce officials agreed to expedite the granting of licenses that had prevented 1,600 tons of cassava from entering Thailand, officials and exporters said. The cassava, which had been stuck in trucks ...

Cambodia’s rubber exports increased 23 per cent in the first quarter of this year on the same period last year, while rubber prices continue to decrease, according to figures from the General Directorate of Rubber under the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. The data ...

Due to the rapid growth of the Kingdom’s coastal city of Sihanoukville, the amount of rubbish being produced daily has skyrocketed from just 100 to 200 tonnes per day in 2015 to a staggering 1,000 tonnes today, prompting Preah Sihanouk’s governor to request World Bank ...

Cambodia’s Beng Per Wildlife Sanctuary is symbolic of the country’s poor forestry management. Around 2,000 square kilometres (sq km) – around three times the size of Singapore – is lost to illegal logging in Cambodia every year where wildlife sanctuaries – despite their name – ...