Economy and commerce

Cambodia’s 38 microfinance institutions reported a 44 percent increase in loan disbursements in 2013, according to a report of the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC), the regulator of banking and finance institutions in the country. The microfinance institutions had lent a total 1.17 billion U.S. dollars ...

More than 100 vendors from Phe Leu market in Kratie town protested yesterday after they arrived at work to find security guards refusing to let them sell at their usual spots, vendors said. More than 20 unarmed guards blocked the protesters, forcing them to set up ...

Trade between Cambodia and neighboring Thailand reached 4.5 billion U.S. dollars in 2013, up 12 percent from 4 billion U.S. dollars a year earlier, Cambodian Minister of Commerce Sun Chanthol said Thursday. Of the amount, Cambodia’s export to Thailand was equivalent to 351 million U.S. dollars, ...

The director of a CPP senator’s sugar plantation accused of stealing land from hundreds of families said Wednesday that most locals were happy with the new jobs the plantation has generated, a week after a visiting European Union parliamentarian renewed calls for an investigation of ...

Insurance providers sold far fewer motor vehicle and personal accident policies in 2013 than in the previous year, sparking concern among some in the industry that the importance of being covered in case of a road accident isn’t getting through to drivers. According to the General ...

 Flag carrier Philippine Airlines (PAL) is said to be better off not pursuing a deal with Royal Group of Cambodia (RGC) to form Cambodia Airlines Co. Ltd., saying there are other “bigger priorities” for the flag carrier. CAPA said the Cambodia-Philippines is a small market, ...

Cambodia’s strong economic growth and foreign investment are subject to “considerable” downside risks, the International Monetary Fund has warned. A staff report released in Washington late Tuesday said “economic activity remains strong driven by robust exports, with garment exports helped by preferential access to European Union.” At ...

The Cambodian government recently awarded the operator of its three international airports more than $100 million for upgrades in an effort to accommodate strong passenger growth driven by the country’s nascent tourism industry. Cambodia Airports—the subsidiary of Italian firm Vinci, which serves as the concession ...

Compared to the bustling tourist center of Siem Reap, Phnom Penh has long stood in second place as an investment destination for international hotel operations. But as infrastructure slowly improves and the number of visitors to the capital continues to grow, international hotel chains are taking ...

Slapping Khmer song lyrics over international hits or ripping off the creative content of foreign-produced music videos is a practice in the Kingdom that must end within one year, Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts officials said at a conference in the capital yesterday. A crackdown ...

Operating revenue at the partly state-owned mail service, Cambodia Post (CP), rose more than 10 per cent last year compared to 2012, according to a senior government official. Ork Bora, CP’s general director, said that revenue reached $4.56 million, an increase of 12.54 per cent from ...

Starting later this month, 10,000 small and medium-sized businesses will be queried as part of a Japanese government-backed economic census intended to take a snapshot of activity across the private sector. Beginning on February 23 and running through to March 31, Cambodia’s National Institute of Statistics ...

Meeting for a minimum wage workshop on Tuesday, the country’s independent and government-aligned unions argued over reforms to the Labor Advisory Committee (LAC), the body in charge of setting the minimum wage in the garment sector, which employs some 600,000 workers. The LAC, which is composed ...

Moc Bai Border Gate Economic Zone is located on the Trans-Asia Road that starts from Myanmar, goes to Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam and ends at Quangxi, China. It was built with three border gates on an area of 21,283ha, covering the communes of Long Thuan, ...

Amid falling local production in Italy, officials there are calling on the European Union to scrap a preferential trade agreement that gives Cambodia’s rice exports duty-free advantages in the global market. According to a January 31 report from rice industry publication Oryza, members of the Italian ...

At 10 a.m. on January 3, about 2,000 members of the security forces, mostly military police, advanced down Phnom Penh’s factory-lined Veng Sreng Street, spraying AK-47 assault rifle fire into a crowd of about 100 protesters who had been throwing stones and crude Molotov cocktails. ...

Cambodian and Vietnamese foreign ministers are to meet on Feb 10-11 to boost the economic, cultural, scientific and technological cooperation between the two countries, according to a statement of the Ministry of the Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. ...

About 100 monks, activists and workers returned on Saturday evening to the Canadia Industrial Park, where garment workers clashed with military police on January 3, to pray for the five protesters who were shot dead in the violence and call for the release of 23 ...

Japan will introduce direct flights to and from Cambodia this year in an effort to bolster trade, investment and tourism between the two nations, Prime Minister Hun Sen said on Friday. Hun Sen announced the plan at a meeting with a delegation led by Hideo ...

Market vendors hawking pirated government textbooks have a month to get their shops in order if they want to avoid an authority-led crackdown, a statement released on Friday by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport warns. Selling or buying textbooks labelled “not for sale” or ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen of Cambodia believes that within 6 months, Cambodia will have direct flight from Japan, which will help promote tourism and investment in the Kingdom. The Premier made such comment January 31 during his meeting with Delegates of World Tourism led by Mr. ...

Cambodia’s economy is expected to grow by 7.2 percent this year, and pick up to 7.5 percent next year, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said. The IMF hailed Cambodia for making good progress in achieving the Millennium Development Goals and reducing poverty substantially. It said ...

Cambodia exported 300,000 tons of fresh and dry cassava in 2013, down 58 percent compared with the 720,000 tons recorded a year earlier, according to figures by the Commerce Ministry on Saturday. The country earned a revenue of 16 million US dollars from cassava export last ...

Sugar plantations that benefit from the European Union’s Everything But Arms (EBA) scheme, which allows preferential access to the E.U.’s market, have further impoverished Cambodia’s poor, and an investigation needs to be launched, a member of the European Parliament (MEP) said on Friday. Patrice Tirolien, MEP ...