Social development
Education and training
Child labor probe on Preah Vihear sugar plantation moves forward
Police in Preah Vihear province say they have uncovered more evidence of child labor on a Chinese-owned sugarcane plantation and will send the case to court if further investigation confirms their preliminary findings. A former employee of the Lan Feng plantation filed a complaint last month ...
Khy Sovuthy
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/child-labor-probe-on-preah-vihear-sugar-plantation-moves-forward-55643/
Ministry, ACU continue campaign for clean high school exam
The Education Ministry’s crusade to clean up the national high school exam continued Wednesday, with the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) releasing a statement inviting concerned parties to monitor exams in August and warning that cheats would be failed and effectively banned from sitting again for two ...
Kuch Naren and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/ministry-acu-continue-campaign-for-clean-high-school-exam-55667/
Moratorium on new universities
The Ministry of Education has vowed to shift its focus from the quantity of the country’s universities to their quality by instituting a moratorium on the approval of new institutions, officials said yesterday. Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron said that with more than 100 universities already ...
Chhay Channyda
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/moratorium-new-universities
Official says Cambodia not ready for ASEAN Free Trade
Cambodia is not prepared to join Asean’s single regional market and production base next year, a Labor Ministry official said Friday. Next year, the 10 nations of Asean are to create the Asean Economic Community (AEC). Within this community, labor is to flow freely and import ...
Denise Hruby
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/official-says-cambodia-not-ready-for-asean-free-trade-55203/
Workers to file stories from the factory floor
The Cambodian Center for Independent Media (CCIM) is hoping to turn a select group of garment workers into muckrakers by offering a journalism program through the Voice of Democracy news outlet. Free of charge, the course will last until October and have a firm focus on ...
Mom Kunthear
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/workers-file-stories-factory-floor
Boxes for donations, not bribes: minister
The minister of education proposed yesterday that donation boxes for teachers be installed in schools across the country, but stressed their aim would be to diminish rather than grow a culture of bribery in the system. Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron presented the idea for the ...
Chhay Channyda
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/boxes-donations-not-bribes-minister
Education official says don’t jail exam cheats
A senior Education Ministry official on Thursday said that jailing students caught cheating, as threatened by the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) on Tuesday, was the wrong approach to cleaning up the national high school exam. Instead, he called for a budget increase to offset losses that teachers ...
Matt Blomberg and Sek Odom
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/education-official-says-dont-jail-exam-cheats-55135/
Exam proctors promised pay boost
The Ministry of Education is promising to pay national exam proctors double the fees earned last year in its newest move to stymie widespread bribes exchanged for exam answers or inflated scores. Previously, proctors earned an average salary of 190, 000 riel ($47.50) over the three-day ...
Chhay Channyda, P.4
http://phnompenhpost.com
ACU Threatens Jail for Students Caught Cheating
The Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) will join with the Ministry of Education this year to curb cheating during national-level high school and junior high exams, according to ACU chairman Om Yentieng. In order to eliminate old habits of purchasing answer sheets and paying bribes to exam monitors, ...
Kuch Naren
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/acu-threatens-jail-for-students-caught-cheating-54933/
U.S. holds intellectual property rights workshop for Cambodian, Lao officials
The United States government on Tuesday organized an intellectual property rights (IPR) enforcement workshop for some 50 Cambodian and Lao law enforcement officials. ...
Xinhuanet News Staff
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2014-03/25/c_133212172.htm
New policy to combat corruption in schools
The Education Ministry will reconfigure how it ranks high school graduates seeking placement at state universities as part of its campaign to promote accountability in the school system, Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron announced on Friday. Delivering closing remarks at the Education Ministry’s annual meeting, Mr. ...
Kuch Naren and Emily Wilkins
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/new-policy-to-combat-corruption-in-schools-54886/
ACU tackles exam cheats
Cheating on national grade nine and 12 exams – which has been rampant in the past – just got harder. The Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) announced yesterday that it will enlist the services of independent NGOs, civil society groups and private companies to monitor the more than ...
Chhay Channyda and Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/acu-tackles-exam-cheats
Safe water lowers absenteeism
Reducing absenteeism in schools in developing countries may be as simple as providing students with safe drinking water. A new study indicates that, but researchers are not sure why. The study was done at eight schools in Cambodia where the attendance records of more than 3,500 ...
Joe Decapua
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/water-absenteeism-18mar14/1874739.html
GMAC trains companies how to resolve labor disputes
The Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) says it will hold a one-day training course on procedures to resolve labor disputes on Tuesday. ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=13&token=OTcwMDFiYjIwY2U
CAMBODIA: Study shows school attendance rises with safe water drinking & child hydration
Considered the world’s most valuable fluid, fresh clean water is a commodity that can become a life-and-death issue. Lack of it can also contribute to a child’s absenteeism rate in Cambodia, says a newly released study report by Research Advisor Helen Risebro and Professor Paul Hunter ...
Women News Network (WNN) News Staff
http://womennewsnetwork.net/2014/03/18/cambodia-school-attendance/
Education boost needed: PM
Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday encouraged Cambodia to pick up the slack on its higher-education system in order to bolster the country’s economic competitiveness. “Training human resources is necessary to developing the labour market and encouraging investments,” the premier said during the Royal University of Law ...
Chhay Channyda and Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/education-boost-needed-pm
Be glad you’re not paid in rice, Prime Minister tells teachers
Prime Minister Hun Sen advised the country’s newest crop of teachers not to feel down about their poor salaries, recalling that were they embarking on their careers in the aftermath of the Khmer Rouge regime their pay would be a few bags of rice each ...
Khy Sovuthy
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/be-glad-youre-not-paid-in-rice-prime-minister-tells-teachers-53965/
National testing could widen
Cambodia may soon have new standardised exams to hold its students, teachers and education system accountable. “Everyone agrees that the improved enrolment rates in primary school is an accomplishment; at the same time, everyone also calls for quality-control improvement [which] means better testing,” said Jan ...
Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/national-testing-could-widen
ILO, Camfeba outline ways to improve investment climate
The International Labor Organization said it would launch on Wednesday two reports outlining ways to improve the investment climate in Cambodia. The first report, by the ILO, analyses Cambodia’s performance in 17 areas and contains a national survey of workers and employers. Key areas include ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://www.thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=13&token=YzJiMjE2YzkzYTA
Cambodia among best performers in cutting numbers of children out of school
Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam are among the world’s top ten performers in reducing the proportion of children out of school, according to a recent UNESCO report. The report, released in January and launched in Phnom Penh on Thursday, also showed that Thailand was among the world’s ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://www.thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=15&token=ZWY2MWMzNWQ2ZTJ
Britain eyes 5 bln USD trade volume with Cambodia by 2020: envoy
British Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy David Puttnam said Thursday that the country looked to boost bilateral trade volume with Cambodia to $5 billion by 2020. “The bilateral trade between the UK and Cambodia reached $1 billion last year and we expect the trade volume will hit ...
Global Times
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/846621.shtml#.UxlBOD-Sylt
UNESCO says quality of education remains major concern for Cambodia
The quality of education is still a big concern for Cambodia and the country needs to set a more effective strategy to enhance teaching conditions and quality of education for all learners, Anne Lemaistre, UNESCO representative in Cambodia, said Thursday. “I would like to commend ...
Xinhuanet News Staff
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/culture/2014-03/06/c_133165742.htm
For Yunus, charity is not the only way
Professor Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel laureate who is considered the founding father of microfinance, urged an assembled crowd at the Royal University of Phnom Penh yesterday to start thinking about creating so-called social businesses. “Charity money goes, and does wonderful work, but it doesn’t come back,” ...
Joe Freeman
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/yunus-charity-not-only-way
Cambodia needs to build human capital for ASEAN Community 2015: PM
Cambodia needs to build qualified and competent human capital to prepare for competition when the ASEAN Economic Community becomes a reality at the end of 2015, Prime Minister Hun Sen said Tuesday. “The Cambodian government will focus its attention on strengthening education quality and technical vocational ...
Xinhuanet News Staff
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2014-03/04/c_133160359.htm