Economy and commerce

The government is drafting a rubber law to regulate the sector in response to the rapid growth of rubber plantations across the country, an official said. Ly Phalla, director general of the General Directorate of Rubber at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, said officials ...

Cambodia Angkor Air (CAA) intends to acquire seven more planes by 2015, more than doubling its existing fleet of five, as the airline plans new routes in the next few years to China, South Korea, Hong Kong and India. The plan was unveiled at an industry ...

A rights worker and forestry official yesterday contradicted a local newspaper report claiming that more than $100 million worth of timber had been illegally extracted from Ratanakirri province’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary. Adhoc’s provincial coordinator for Ratanakirri, Chhay Thy, denied having said a total of 16,000 ...

A rubber company that has been repeatedly accused of encroaching on communal land belonging to an ethnic minority in Ratanakkiri province has cleared 150 hectares of forest outside of its economic land concession (ELC) in the past month, according to the senior investigator for local ...

More than a week after the World Bank blacklisted a Canadian construction firm over bribes allegedly paid in Cambodia and Bangladesh, it was still unclear Thursday whether the government, or the national anticorruption body, are investigating the allegations. SNC-Lavalin Inc. was banned from World Bank contracts ...

Group Lease has decided to raise the capital of its wholly owned Singaporean subsidiary Group Lease Holdings to serve as the main funding source for its Cambodian motorcycle leasing operations after six months of satisfactory trial operations there. Cambodia, which is managed by Group Lease’s ...

Small pig farmers are struggling to stay in business as illegal imports of pigs from neighbouring countries rise, squeezing them out of the market, industry insiders say. Srun Peu, deputy director of the Cambodia Pig Farmers Association, an organisation with 4,000 members, said the increase in ...

Cambodia’s first dairy factory is being planned for Phnom Penh, as one of the owners, a Vietnam-based dairy company, hopes to tap strong local demand for its products. The 2.7-hectare factory, in the Phnom Penh Special Economic Zone (PPSEZ), would produce condensed milk, yoghurt and UHT ...

Farmers can expect better rice paddy yields this year compared to last year after the Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology yesterday predicted that the rainy season would run from mid-May until November with only a short dry spell. Chhomg Sopal, agriculture development ...

To enhance Cambodian rice yields, the government should encourage private development of rice-seed production and focus its efforts on farmers’ education and regulations that ensure the quality of seed, industry experts say. The Cambodian Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI), under the direction of the Ministry ...

Cambodians, particularly young adults, are more often turning to banks to help them buy their homes, according to figures obtained from the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC) yesterday. From $179 million in 2008, the total sum lent out to those buyers fell to $94.5 million ...

A helicopter flight tour to Preah Vihear is just one part of the 10-day Cambodia Immersion for Millionaires Tour launched this week. The cost per person? $25,000. According to Christopher Gramsch, sales manager for organiser Khiri Travel Cambodia, there is increasing demand among high-spending travellers and ...

Farmers in Kompong Chhnang province locked in a land dispute with a local businesswoman are waiting for the government to make a decision on who owns the property after student volunteers measured the area earlier this month as part of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s nationwide ...

Rubber exports from Cambodia were up over 17 per cent in the first quarter of 2013, but the revenue from rubber stayed steady as prices decline worldwide, according to data from the Ministry of Commerce. The data showed that in the first quarter of this year, ...

Entertainment Gaming Asia will open up it’s second Dreamworld Club in Cambodia in the Thai-Cambodia border town of Poipet, in  Banteay Meanchey province,  according to a media release from the US-listed company on Monday. ...

Cambodian export values increased more than 21 per cent in the first quarter of this year compared with the same period last year, and officials said the rise was a positive sign for the Kingdom’s economic growth. According to the Ministry of Commerce’s export data ...

Cambodia’s construction sector is facing a massive labor shortage due to a recent boom in construction projects throughout the country and workers migrating en masse to Thailand in search of higher wages. In 2012, the construction sector expanded rapidly with the total value of approved projects ...

The volume of cargo passing through the Sihanoukville Autonomous Port (SAP) rose 15 per cent in the first quarter of this year compared with the corresponding period last year. Experts say milled-rice exports and fuel imports contributed to the boost in activity. From January to March, ...

Parliamentarians of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam gathered in Cambodia’s northeastern Mondulkiri province on Wednesday to discuss the parliaments’ role in supporting the three countries’ Development Triangle Area, according to a media release from Cambodian National Assembly. Speaking at the opening of the two-day meeting, the ...

U.S. listed gambling firm Entertainment Gaming Asia Inc. (EGA) will next month hold a grand opening for its second casino on the Thai-Cambodia border, the company said. In a statement issued on Monday from Hong Kong, it said that Dreamworld Club in Poipet, which has been ...

Cambodia had granted operating licenses to 606 new companies in the first quarter of this year, a 33 percent decrease compared with the 904 firms at the same period last year, the Commerce Ministry’s report showed Tuesday. Yim Rom, an official at the ministry’s statistics ...

Acleda Bank, a leading commercial bank in Cambodia, on Monday signed a Memorandum of Understanding with UnionPay International on payment services for mutual benefits, according to the bank’s statement. Xu Luode, president of China UnionPay and vice-chairman of UnionPay International, said currently, UnionPay cards reached ...

Cambodia saw a 1.7 per cent rise in inflation in February compared with the same month the previous year. Prices of food and fuel rose, according to official data from the National Institute of Statistics (NIS). “The increase for all index group of a 1.7 per ...

Internet search giant Google on Friday launched a new service that for the first time allows users to instantly translate Khmer script into other languages. Khmer is the most recent addition to the 66-strong collection of languages between which words, sentences or whole websites can be ...