Agriculture

A local conservation group yesterday called for several changes to a draft sub-decree meant to turn Cambodia’s Prey Long Forest into a protected area, concerned it could end up harming, rather than conserving, the forest. ...

The cabinet approved a plan for the Public Warehouse Organisation to import 450,000 tonnes of tariff-free maize from Laos and Cambodia. Another 250,000 tonnes of maize would be imported from Cambodia, with 100,000 tonnes in August and another 150,000 tonnes between November and January 2014 ...

A Chinese conglomerate headed by an adviser to Senate President Chea Sim plans to begin extracting gold and copper in Siem Reap province in two months, the firm’s chairman said yesterday. Khmer Holding, a group of companies that claims vast mineral interests in Cambodia, opened an ...

Kampot pepper yields are expected to increase significantly in the first harvest since gaining Geographic Indicator status in April 2010, as increased demand from exporters drives up prices. Output this season is expected to surge by 17 per cent, from 23 tonnes in the last harvest ...

The Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) has arrested two employees of a local company linked to a British biofuel firm currently under investigation by the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO), an official said Friday. ACU President Om Yentieng said that International Green Energy (IGE) director Oum Sam­nang, and ...

More than 8,000 hectares of land was cut from economic and forest land concessions owned by some of the country’s biggest tycoons and awarded to villagers last month, according to documents from the Council of Ministers. Four sub-decrees signed by Prime Minister Hun Sen order that ...

Cambodia recorded a 17 percent rise in rubber latex exports in 2012; however, the revenues from the exports went down by 21 percent due to declining rubber prices in the international market, the government’s statistics showed Friday. The country had exported 54,530 tons of rubber latex ...

One hot day in June, 2009, Ven Samin, a member of the ethnic Suoy minority in Kampong Speu province, grabbed her digital camera and headed out of the house. The 44-year-old arrived at a collection of damaged rice paddies in Oral district and began taking photos. ...

Mesco Gold, an associated company of India-based Mesco Steel, will sign an agreement with Angkor Gold to mine the Phum Syrang prospect on one of its economic land concessions in Ratanakkiri province. “We’ve been exploring the area since 2006. We’ve been drilling holes and there’s ...

Cambodia exported more than 200,000 tons of milled rice in 2012, the greatest yield on record, though well short of the government target to export 1 million tons by 2015. Speaking at the Ministry of Agriculture’s annual meeting in Phnom Penh, Agriculture Minister Chan Sarun said ...

About 80 families travelling to Phnom Penh from Kampong Chhnang province for a land dispute-related protest yesterday were blocked on their way to the capital and told to resolve the matter locally. The villagers are locked in an unusual land feud with an agricultural firm, ...

Heavy rainfall over the weekend has destroyed all the salt that was due to be harvested this month in Kep and Kampot provinces, farmers said yesterday. “The salt that we planned to harvest this week was completely destroyed because of heavy rain,” said Um Chon, chief ...

During a joint investigation with police and military police last week, the Forestry Administration found evidence of large-scale illegal logging by the Vietnamese owners of a rubber concession in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Yadaw district, officials said yesterday. ...

Cargo shipments through Sihanoukville’s Deep Sea Port increased more than seven per cent year-on-year in 2012. Port officials say this growth is a result of Cambodia’s economic performance and an improving global economy. “It is a fast rate of growth compared with previous years. We had ...

Rulling party Senator Ly Yong Phat’s Phnom Penh Sugar Company announced yesterday that it had amended its hiring policy to forbid contractors from employing children, while at the same time, opposition parliamentarian Mu Sochua made public her plans to visit the company to investigate its ...

Hundreds of families in Ratanakki­ri province have asked rights group Adhoc to intervene, saying local authorities in Bakeo district’s Laminh commune are illegally forcing them from their homes. Village representative, Ek Orm, 52, said that authorities were forcing villagers to relocate to make way for a ...

First, agricultural company DM group displaced them, now a recently arrived commercial farmer has threatened their lives and chased them off their new land, said representatives of 12 families engaged in a long-standing land dispute in Ratanakkiri province. On Wednesday, the 12 Tampuon ethnic minority families ...

A Vietnamese rubber company in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Yadaw district yesterday agreed to pay $4,000 in compensation to an ethnic Jarai community whose traditional graveyard was bulldozed by the firm last week, local officials said. During a meeting at the Paknhai commune police station, representatives of the ...

More than seven months after government security forces violently evicted hundreds of people living in Kratie province’s Broma village to quell a so-called secessionist movement, more than 70 families are still being prevented by patrolling soldiers from returning to the site of their former homes, ...

More than a month after halting construction around a disputed land concession in Ratanakkiri province, a Vietnam-based company has reportedly gone a step further and agreed to return 30 hectares of razed forest, a village representative and commune chief maintained yesterday. ...

Exports of milled rice had fallen dramatically last year because of the poor quality of paddy rice, insiders said yesterday. Milled-rice producers told the Post that a large amount of paddy rice broke. From every 100 kilograms of paddy rice, 20 to 23 kilograms of milled rice ...

When the harvest season for Kampot pepper starts next month, farmers in Kampot province expect this year’s crop to yield more than 17 percent above last year, a representative of the farmers said. Nguon Lay, president of the Kampot Pepper Association, said last week that ...

Cambodia and China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on Tuesday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on strengthening bilateral communication and cooperation in agriculture. The deal was inked between Lord Reasmey, secretary-general of Cambodia’s Ministry of Agriculture, and Zhang Mingpei, director- general of Department of Agriculture of ...

Amid mounting calls for government intervention to stop the destruction of indigenous land by a Vietnamese rubber company in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Yadaw district, the Forestry Administration has begun investigating claims that the firm is logging illegally and clearing land outside of its concession, officials said ...