Economy and commerce

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) ...

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 ...

Security barricades and razor-wire installations set up around Phnom Penh yesterday were supposed to maintain order as the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party kicked off what it promised to be three days of mass protests. But the show of force and control had more of an ...

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 ...

State-owned Green Trade Company has signed an agreement with China’s Shandong Meijing Rice Co Ltd to export 100,000 tonnes of Cambodia’s milled rice. The deal was signed between Chinese and Cambodian officials on September 4 at the China-ASEAN summit in the southwest Chinese city of Nanning, ...

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 ...

A 20-story retail and office building development opposite Phnom Penh’s Freedom Park by U.K.-based Hongkong Land Ltd. (HKL) is being built without pre-existing rental agreements, the company’s general manager, Daniel Parkes, said Thursday. Land Management Minister Im Chhun Lim last Friday hosted the groundbreaking of the ...

By 10am, Siv Lin, the owner of a mobile food stall facing Phnom Penh’s Freedom Park, had prepared all the rice, pork, eggs and vegetables needed to serve yesterday’s regular lunch crowd. It was a normal day. But on September 7, when thousands of opposition Cambodia ...

Revenue generated by the country’s insurance firms increased 25 percent to $22 million in the first six months of this year compared to the same period last year, according to data released Tuesday by the General Insurance Association of Cambodia (GIAC). Engineering insurance has become the ...

India-based Tata International Ltd announced yesterday that it would import and distribute its Farmtrac Tractors in Cambodia to profit from the country’s growing agricultural sector. Speaking at the launching ceremony at the Koh Pich exhibition centre, Jitendra Manghinani, country manager of Tata South East Asia (Cambodia), ...

OZ Minerals has emerged with 16 per cent of Cambodia-focused Renaissance Minerals after agreeing to push back a deal that could have forced the gold explorer to stump up a $10 million payment on its Okvau deposit in the South-East Asian nation. Renaissance’s purchase of the ...

Taiwan’s E. Sun Commercial Bank has purchased a 70 per cent stake in Cambodia’s Union Commercial Bank. The deal, planned for months but announced yesterday at a press conference at the Sofitel hotel in Phnom Penh, will bring technology upgrades and more loan capital to the ...

An investment company owned by the Singaporean government is a minority partner in a fully licensed commercial bank set to open later this month in cooperation with Canadia Bank PLC and the country’s postal service, a source familiar with the deal confirmed Tuesday. Fullerton Financial Holdings, ...

While New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra is working overtime to restore its damaged brand in the wake of a contaminated baby milk scare that triggered a global recall, local distributors whose products included the suspect ingredient are defending their own reputations. Local supplier Dumex Cambodia ...

A Thai-owned sugar company has threatened legal action against a newspaper that ran a story and video depicting the use of child labour at its Koh Kong province plantation, but advocates on the ground there say the children are indeed used as employees. The Bangkok Post yesterday reported ...

Cambodia’s General Department of Taxation said Monday it had collected 606 million U.S. dollars of tax [sic] in the first eight months of the year, up 17 percent compared with the same period last year. The revenue came from tax on profit, withholding tax, tax on ...

Singapore Banking Corporation Ltd. (SBC Bank), a leading commercial bank in Cambodia, signed a memorandum of understanding with JCB International Co., Ltd. (JCBI), the international operations subsidiary of JCB, for the issuance of JCB cards in Cambodia. A ceremony to commemorate the milestone moment was held ...

Investments in Cambodia’s construction sector have continued to grow sharply in the first six months of the year thanks to sound economic growth and investors’ trust in the country’s political stability, Im Chhun Lim, the country’s Minister of Land Management, Urban Planning and Construction, said ...

Responding to growing demand in US and EU markets, organic rice exports have surged, reaching 200 tonnes in the first six months of this year, compared with 100 tonnes for all of last year. Exports of organic rice are meagre compared with other varieties, such ...

The usually static share price of the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority (PPWSA), still the only company listed on the Cambodia Securities Exchange (CSX), fell Monday to its lowest price since it began trading more than two years ago. At the close of business Monday, the ...

Japan-based Mizuho Bank (MHBK) has signed an agreement with two well-established banks in Cambodia that is designed to help Mizuho leverage a wider range of financial services when dealing with Japanese clients. The memorandum of understanding was inked on Friday in Phnom Penh between Mizuho’s president ...

Cambodian-focused Geopacific Resources (ASX: GPR) has now released its 10 for 17 non-renounceable rights issue which will raise up to A$3.0 million at $0.05, and forms part of a larger funding package. In August GPR outlined a funding package which will include an equity placement of ...

Microsoft Cambodia has appointed Thakral Cambodia Industries Limited as its second authorised software distributor in the country, a move intended to help the computer giant’s local operation combat the rampant use of pirated software. Thakral, one of the largest distributors of IT products in Cambodia (its ...

Hongkong Land broke ground on Friday on a $100 million mixed-use development project in Phnom Penh’s financial district. Called Landmark, the building by the Hong Kong-based property group will be on a 10,700-square metre site on Street 106 near the capital’s Freedom Park. “One of Hongkong Land’s ...