Economy and commerce

Loan disbursals in Cambodia’s banking sector increased by 33 percent to more than $4 billion last year, as credit to the housing market and agricultural sector saw the largest amount of growth, the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC) said in its annual report, released yesterday. While ...

Quashing hopes of opening the Phnom Penh Port for the high trade season that begins in July, the port’s director said the pace of construction would push the official launch date into next year. ...

Housekeeping and front offices at hotels around Cambodia are set to change as the country prepares to adopt regional standards that all ASEAN nations are trying to put in place. The draft document on housekeeping and front-office standards, and related training courses, had been finalised by Tourism ...

In an effort to bolster bilateral trade, Commerce Minister Cham Prasidh and his Thai counterpart, Boonsong Teriyapirom, agreed in Bangkok on Sunday to establish a special economic border zone, Thai media reported yesterday. Though it remained unclear when or where the zone would be set up, ...

The Kingdom’s first life insurance company, Cambodian Life, launched yesterday, courting a market almost entirely unfamiliar with the service. Industry insiders said demand for the products would need time to grow. The establishment of Cambodian Life in the Kingdom would develop confidence in the market and ...

Three Banteay Meanchey gold vendors accused of buying stolen goods were arrested yesterday then released four hours later after about 200 fellow gold sellers demonstrated on their behalf outside Mongkol Borei district police headquarters. The district governor personally intervened and mediated the release, district police chief ...

Cambodia’s Power Partner Profit Group has signed 10 memoranda of understanding with Chinese companies for cooperation on agriculture, mineral resources and electronics. Insiders said the penning of the MoUs, which do not guarantee a final agreement, was another step toward realising a US$5 billion bilateral trade ...

When it became the first—and still the only—company to list on Cambodia’s stock market on April 18, the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority saw its share price shoot up some 50 percent on its first day of trading before beginning two weeks of steady decline. Since ...

After a three-day blockade, soldiers pulled out over the weekend from the Kratie province village where a teenage girl was shot dead last week by government security forces, officials said yesterday. However, human rights workers denied a report by a provincial official that freedom of ...

PHNOM PENH – Cambodian and Chinese firms on Friday signed a number of memorandums of understanding (MOUs) on business cooperation in the fields of agriculture, mineral resources, food, garment, and electronic products. ...

The Svay Rieng Provincial Court on Friday questioned three female factory workers who were shot, allegedly by Bavet City Governor Chhouk Bundith, during a protest inside a special economic zone (SEZ) in February, the plaintiffs said. More than 20 union leaders and labor activists also gathered ...

The United Kingdom Trade and Investment Office would establish a permanent branch in Phnom Penh in the expectation that economic ties between the two countries would continue to grow, Cambodian and UK officials said yesterday. Bilateral trade has risen by 300 per cent during the past ...

Considering the growth potential of US$400-million worth in bilateral trade between the United Kingdom and Cambodia for the past five years, the British Trade and Investment office plans to establish its permanent branch in Phnom Penh. British companies are eyeing investment opportunities in education, construction and ...

Growing demand for pork on the Thai market since March has lead to an increase in the price of live pigs in Cambodia, as Thai farmers reduce the amount of live pigs exported to Cambodia in order to fuel local demand, officials said yesterday. ...

An appeal hearing in South Korea involving the CEOs behind two major property projects in Cambodia involved in a massive fraud scandal is scheduled to begin today, an official at the court in Seoul said. In February, a Seoul court sentenced a raft of executives of ...

Cambodia’s rice exports in 2012 may fall significantly compared to last year, due to high fuel prices, soaring logistics costs and high prices. According to local sources, Cambodian rice shipments to Europe this month are at a $200 markup per container over those from Thailand and ...

One of the two partners who have created Cambodia’s leading food and beverage company, with 22 outlets, says business is not merely about money, but more about finding a need and serving the need. Kouch Sokly says entrepreneurs need to find out what the market needs ...

Authorities in Kratie province have denied entry to journalists and rights workers to the site of violent land clashes that led to the death of a teenage girl on Wednesday. Rights workers say they fear for the safety of villagers in Broma village, but police say ...

Rapidly increasing logistics costs and low regional rice prices would hinder Cambodia’s rice-export target this year, with one expert saying that milled-rice exports could fall to half of last year’s shipments. The cost of shipping rice to Europe climbed by more than 50 per cent between ...

The Cambodian Center for Study and Development in Agriculture (Cedac) said yesterday it would begin exporting organic rice to Europe in June for the first time as part of a one-year agreement with a German-based equitable trade organization. “We’re looking to break more into the international ...

Chinese, Korean and local investors have shown interest in Meoun Chey border crossing in Prey Veng province’s Komchay Mear district between Cambodia and Vietnam, provincial officials said yesterday. Komchay Mear district governor Prak Savann said the potential investors are looking for land in the area to ...

American packaging firm Crown Holdings Inc. announced Tuesday it would build a new can manufacturing plant in Sihanoukville that will become operational in the second half of 2013. Although it did not say how much the project was worth, the factory will produce 725 million 33 ...

Cambodia’s exports to Thailand jumped 55 per cent year on year in the first quarter of 2012 on what experts and officials said was a smoother political relationship between the countries, as well as an easing of Thai border regulations. The Kingdom shipped US$85.4 million in ...

Cambodia has moved up 27 places on a biennial World Bank list that ranks the ease of importing, exporting and transporting goods in different countries. Cambodia was ranked 101 out of the 155 countries included in the World Bank’s report titled Trade Logistics in the Global ...