Industries

More than 100 military police officers stood guard outside a garment factory in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district on Monday and prevented workers from returning to work, employees and local officials said. Workers from Singaporean-owned SL Garment Factory—which makes clothing for U.S. brands Levi’s and Gap—have been ...

A monitoring group backed by the United Nations said it would begin to publicize garment factories’ compliance with worker rights and safety standards in Cambodia, a controversial program that its organizers say will be the world’s most extensive initiative to improve working conditions at plants. The ...

Solar-powered tuk-tuks could be rolling off the assembly lines in Phnom Penh as early as March next year, allowing local tuk-tuk drivers a cost-effective and greener alternative to using petrol, according to the company manufacturing the vehicle. Star 8, the Australia-based alternative energy firm behind the ...

Nine garment workers and two Chinese managers were injured on Friday in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district after a riot broke out among 300 workers protesting for higher wages and improved working conditions, officials said Sunday. Commune police chief Mao Sovann said workers at the SL Garment ...

At 5am, without any alarm clock going off, a dozen Cambodian maids wake up with near-military precision. Over the next hour, the women sweep, wash and scrub spotless their two-storey training centre in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh. They all want to be maids in Singapore, eager ...

Riot police and groups of men in plain clothes armed with sticks, Tasers and slingshots violently attacked a group of anti-eviction protesters conducting a hunger strike at Wat Phnom late last night, injuring several people. Protesters from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak community began the hunger strike ...

Cambodia’s per capita GDP was projected to hit 1,036 U.S. dollars in 2013, up from nearly 1,000 U.S. dollars in a year earlier, Prime Minister Hun Sen said Saturday. The premier said the country has enjoyed full peace and political stability in the last 15 ...

In the months leading up to Cambodia’s national election on July 28, authorities in the Angkor Archaeological Park allowed dozens of land owners to build new houses and develop plots of land inside highly protected areas of the world heritage site. Villagers interviewed last week said ...

Cambodian Ministry of Commerce said Friday that it had issued operating licenses to 1,952 new companies in the first eight months of the year, down 15 percent compared with the 2,300 firms over the same period last year. During the January-August period this year, the ministry ...

Cambodia’s garment industry, the kingdom’s largest income maker, recorded 3.65 billion U.S. dollars in export value in the first eight months of the year, up 21 percent from 3.01 billion U.S. dollars over the same period last year, the Ministry of Commerce said Friday. Cambodian ...

Cambodia’s General Department of Taxation has laid out a series of reforms it says are needed as the 2015 deadline looms for the Asean Economic Community, a single market for trade and development. Strengthening tax collection to increase revenue while nurturing an attractive investment climate is ...

Because of ongoing strikes and an inability to fill orders, SL Garment Processing (Cambodia) says it is shedding cash flow as buyers shift away from one of Asia’s largest producers, factory management confirmed yesterday. International brands H&M and Gap reduced their orders, while Levi’s ceased buying ...

A Kampong Speu judge released the vice-president and a member of the Free Trade Union on bail yesterday after the court questioned the two about their alleged roles in a violent demonstration at Sabrina Garment factory. ...

In an apparent bid to reassure jittery visitors watching the country’s political scene, the Cambodia Association of Travel Agents (CATA) said in a statement yesterday that post-election tensions would not harm tourists. Addressing its members – tour operators and travel agencies – as well as national ...

Australian green energy company Star 8 has designed a solar-powered tuk-tuk and is in the process of building a factory in Cambodia to make the vehicles, according to a report in Australian newspaper The Age. The vehicles’ makers said the tuk-tuks will cost between A$2,000 (US$1,865) ...

By the time London Fashion Week comes to a close, 58 high-end designers will have shown their collections. Rail-thin models will have walked the runways. Debate will have raged over size zero. In Cambodia, meanwhile, garment workers stitching clothes that supply the UK high street are ...

Despite the demonstration at Freedom Park, razor-wire barricades, blocked streets and clashes between citizens and police in the past two days, it appears that the camp-in and security presence in the city are merely a novelty for some tourists. On Monday afternoon, one couple, Australians John ...

Cambodia has witnessed a trade deficit of 1.41 billion U.S. dollars in the first eight months of the year, according to figures from the Ministry of Commerce on Monday. The country’s total import and export volume was valued at 10.45 billion U.S. dollars during the January-August ...

Inside the grounds of this city’s old provincial hall, past a green corrugated iron fence, municipal street cleaners and their families are squatting in what was once a bustling government office filled with civil servants. Across the road, the former department of rural development is a ...

The Ministry of Social Affairs on Friday established four sub-committees tasked with finding a new minimum wage for the country’s 300,000-plus garment factory workers, Minister Ith Sam Heng said on Friday. “The sub-committees have a limited time of five weeks for research before they have to ...

Four subcommittees formed by the Ministry of Social Affairs met on Friday to begin establishing a new minimum wage for garment workers that will go into effect next year. Following the meeting, Social Affairs Minister Ith Sam Heng told reporters that factory production rates, garment worker ...

Minor Hotel Group Ltd (MHG), a wholly owned subsidiary of Thailand-listed Minor International Public Company Limited (MINT), has acquired majority ownership of Siem Reap-based Sothea Boutique Resort to strengthen MINT’s presence in Southeast Asia. After the $6.4 million deal, the Sothea Resort will be rebranded ...

Cambodia has welcomed 2.43 million international tourists in the first seven months of the year, up 19 percent compared with the 2.04 million tourists over the same period last year, the figures of the Ministry of Tourism said Thursday. During the January-July period this year, Vietnam ...

Although China has undergone an unprecedented economic slowdown, Chinese and Cambodian officials believe it will not seriously affect Cambodia’s economy. Over the past nine months, China’s GDP grew slightly above 7 percent, its slowest pace in 13 years, and some economists expect poor performance for the ...