Economy and commerce
Investment
US Extractive Firms Obliged to Disclose Overseas Payments
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has adopted rules that would make it a legal requirement for listed companies operating in the extractive industries and doing business in Cambodia to disclose all major payments they make to the government. The rules, which were adopted in ...
Conference focus on social enterprises
Cambodia’s second conference on social enterprise is set to take place tomorrow with the aim of tackling poverty, social exclusion and health and environmental problems, organisers say. The all-day conference, at the Cambodia-Japan Conference Centre at the Royal University of Phnom Penh, will facilitate discussions among participants ...
Mining Firm With Local Licenses Sees Investment
BlackRock Inc., the world’s largest investment firm, has purchased a multi-million dollar stake in a mining firm with a gold exploration licenses in Cambodia. Stephen Promnitz, CEO of Indochine Mining, which is listed on the Australian Stock Exchange and holds a gold exploration license in Kratie ...
ASEAN-US business summit next week
United States Trade Representative Ron Kirk, will spend two days, August 30 and 31, in Siem Reap attending the 44th ASEAN Economic Ministers’ meeting and the ASEAN-US Business Summit. He is also scheduled to meet separately with Cambodian leaders and other participating ministers to discuss bilateral ...
Clash, charges roil Ocean
More than 2,500 Ocean Garment factory workers jostled with about 100 military police in the capital’s Dangkor district yesterday in their second protest march over the alleged sexual harassment of four female employees. In an inter-governmental ministerial committee meeting on Tuesday, Ocean – which supplies ...
Seoul Court Releases CEOs Tied to Local Projects
The chief executives of two companies behind major developments in Cambodia-who were jailed in Seoul in February for their part in a major South Korean financial scandal-have been partially cleared and released, according to a court official. Lee Sang-ho – the CEO of World City Co. ...
Customs to Give Preference to Trusted Firms
The department of customs and excise will begin certifying companies it deems trustworthy so that their goods have easier passage across Cambodia’s borders, an official said yesterday. Traders will receive ranks based on compliance with customs rules, he [Nuom Chanrith, the director of planning at the Finance Ministry’s general ...
Sumitomo Mitsui bank returns to Kingdom after 45 years
Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) of Japan will sign a memorandum of understanding with Acleda Bank Plc this weekend for mutual business co-operation. Senior Acleda officials said the agreement would help to improve investment and trade from Japan to Cambodia. Acleda will also give Japanese investors and businesses advice ...
Opportunities, challenges for ASEAN
Cambodia will face both challenges and opportunities when the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) combines its 10 countries into a single market for economic development, a move intended for 2015, officials said during a round-table discussion yesterday. Sok Siphanna, an adviser to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and ...
Rail freight services begin
Railway freight services between Phnom Penh and Touk Meas commune, in Kampot province’s Banteay Meas district, the location of a Siam Cement factory about 40 kilometres north of Kampot town, began yesterday, finally putting the Toll Royal Railways concession on an earning basis. According to Toll Royal Railways ...
UN: invest in women
Cambodia needed to invest in women to aid its development and integration into the ASEAN economic community, United Nations Under Secretary-General Noeleen Heyzer said yesterday. Heyzer, executive secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific(ESCAP), met with Minister of Women’s Affairs Ing Kantha ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012082358228/Business/un-invest-in-cambodian-women.html
Japanese Bank to Sign Agreement With Acleda
One of the largest banks in Japan, Sumimoto Mitsui Banking Co., will sign an agreement with Acleda Bank Friday to share market data and banking services, Acleda announced yesterday. The deal would allow Sumimoto Mitsui, which currently only has a representative branch in Cambodia, to access ...
Firms Go to Arbitration Over Failed Gold Mining License Deal
Despite touting its Cambodian venture on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (FSE), a British registered mining firm’s plan to extract gold in Ratanakkiri province stalled and the firm may face legal action over a failed deal to obtain an exploration license. Astra Resources Plc. has also gone ...
Railway Family Payouts Could Be Increased
The government and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) will start drafting a new resettlement plan this month that could improve the compensation on offer for some of the roughly 200 Phnom Penh families losing their homes because of rehabilitation of the country’s railway network in ...
Bank Would Back Firm to Take Over Rail Project
The Asian Development Bank (ADB), which has so far contributed $84 million toward the rehabilitation of Cambodia’s dilapidated railway network, said yesterday it would support a deal to drop the current railway operator if it means the new concessionaire would foot the $60 to $100 million needed ...
IFC seeks more Australian partnerships in emerging markets
INTERNATIONAL Finance Corporation, the private-sector arm of the Washington-based World Bank, has invested $US805 million ($770m) in Australian projects around the world These projects are in 24 countries and in sectors ranging from financial services to infrastructure. IFC is an investor in three Macquarie Group-sponsored infrastructure ...
Chinese state firm in talks to take over rail project
With renovation work on the country’s dilapidated railway at a standstill, the Ministry of Public Works has entered into talks with a regional consortium backed by one of the largest firms in China to replace the railway’s current operator, officials said yesterday. Faced with a ...
Toll may lose rail rights
A company with ties to one of China’s top state-owned firms will look to push Toll Royal Railways and its local partner Royal Group of Companies out of a 30-year railroad concession with pledge to invest nearly US$850 million to revamp existing lines and build an additional ...
Families Told to Prepare to Vacate Land Needed for Railway Station
Government officials met with more than 200 Phnom Penh families on Friday to lay out the state’s case for ownership of their land and the compensation they can expect when they are evicted from their homes situated along the city’s railway tracks. The $142 million project ...
Firm says gold deposit discovered in Mondolkiri
Renaissance Minerals announced Friday it has discovered a high-grade gold deposit in an area in Mondolkiri province that lies within the Australian firm’s Cambodian Gold Project. The new find is located about 500 meters to the northeast of the company’s Okvau exploration zone. The announcement comes ...
Opposition urges China checks
Prime Minister Hun Sen has called investors from China’s Anhui province to invest in numerous sectors across Cambodia in an effort to spur two-way trade between the Kingdom and China in order accomplish their joint target of US$5 billion in trade by 2015. Meanwhile, Cambodia’s opposition party ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012081758136/Business/opposition-urges-china-checks.html
A Year on, No Sign of Donor Forum Meeting
Exactly one year after the Finance Ministry indefinitely postponed its last top-level meeting with the international aid donors, there is still no sign that the government is ready to set a new date to engage face-to-face with the country’s development partners. The forum is held once ...
Cambodian state-owned telecom firm sees 5% revenue drop in H1
The state-owned Telecom Cambodia reported a 5 percent decline in revenues in the first half of this year due to tough competition in the country’s telecommunication industry, company director general Lao Saroeun said Friday. During the January-June period this year, the firm earned a gross revenue ...
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/business/2012-08/17/c_131792460.htm
For Agricultural Investors, an Abundance of Risks
As wealthy Gulf states look to meet their food needs by investing in agriculture projects abroad, Cambodia-with its underutilized land and attractive foreign investment policies-makes a nearly perfect investment destination. But endemic corruption, land conflicts, a badly implemented economic land concession program, and an unreliable judiciary could ...