Garments and textiles

National Road 3 is to be widened to four lanes under a government development scheme financed by a Chinese loan. Speaking yesterday in a meeting with garment workers at Vattanac Industrial Park II, which is on National Road 3, Prime Minister Hun Sen said the upgrade ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday continued his bid to woo the Kingdom’s thousands-strong bloc of garment workers, reminding workers of the perils of former opposition leader Sam Rainsy’s proposal to leverage an EU embargo on garment imports to improve the country’s political and human rights ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has ordered officials to set up health centres next to factories and areas where workers live to improve treatment for staff who fall sick. ...

While industry, particularly the textile, travel bag and footwear sectors, is diversifying to high value added products, upgrading of high technology and modern machinery is needed for all factories, a senior official at the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) said. ...

The Cambodian Labour Confederation said garment workers need a monthly wage of $224 to survive, a steep rise from Prime Minister Hun Sen’s proposed increase to $168. ...

A controversial universal minimum wage law will be passed this year in order to prevent a repeat of the mass protests over garment sector wages that rocked the country in 2013, Labour Minister Ith Sam Heng said yesterday, despite calls for revisions from independent unions ...

Garment and footwear manufacturers have called on the government to provide facilities to help offset the higher costs on production that they will face as the result of a benefits package that Prime Minister Hun Sen pledged to garment factory workers this week. ...

H.E. Ok Boung, Secretary of State at the Ministry of Commerce, held a discussion with H.E. Ms. Pottie Donica, Canadian Ambassador to Cambodia, on bilateral trade relations, mainly in garment sector, at the ministry office on Monday afternoon, said the ministry’s news release. ...

Exports to the US saw a modest rebound during the first half of the year, benefiting in part from new trade privileges that allow Cambodian-made travel goods to enter the world’s biggest consumer market duty-free, a Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) representative said yesterday. ...

Cambodia’s garment exports grew slower than expected by about 4 percent in the first half of the year compared with 9 percent in the same period last year while foreign investment in the sector fell by 30 percent, according to a report released by the ...

An international alliance of NGOs has started a campaign to urge two prominent U.K. clothing retailers and a Canadian brand to compensate 208 factory workers who lost their jobs when the Chung Fai Knitwear factory abruptly closed a year ago. ...

The Chinese government has pledged to build a vocational training centre in Preah Sihanouk province to help Cambodians develop skills for the workplace. Labour Minister Ith Samheng signed the deal to build the centre as he led ministry delegates on an official visit to China this ...

The Garment Manufacturers’ Association of Cambodia (GMAC) yesterday officially launched the GMAC Human Resources Club to build a knowledge bank, share information, experience and expertise to improve the industry. ...

The British government has attempted to assuage the fears of least developed countries (LDCs) including Cambodia by assuring them that they will retain their trade privileges to the United Kingdom following the country’s exit from the European Union ...

Ten union representatives were yesterday suspended from the Southland garment factory in Phnom Penh’s Por Sen Chey district after more than a thousand workers went on strike to protest the factory’s decisions about time taken off for voting in Sunday’s commune elections. ...

Exports grew at a solid pace in 2016, rising by 7.2 percent to $7.3 billion, but the number of registered exporting factories fell by 10.4 per cent, while the number of workers declined by 2.9 per cent, compared to 2015.   ...

While Cambodia’s garment sector exhibited solid growth last year, employment levels declined, raising concerns about a potential rise in unregulated subcontracting, the International Labour Organization (ILO) said in a report released yesterday. ...

Cambodia’s garment factories appear to be ramping up their use of subcontractors, which tend to get the least attention from regulators and raise the most fears of abuse among labor rights groups, according to a report released on Monday. ...

Cambodia’s garment manufacturing industry has eclipsed rival Vietnam as a supplier of products to the European Union and is on course to overtake India, a visiting industry insider said yesterday. ...

Germany-based apparel industry trade fair organiser Messe Frankfurt France signed a memorandum of understanding with the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia yesterday to offer discounted exhibitor fees to Cambodian manufacturers in a deal valued at €400,000 ($450,000). ...

Cambodia’s upgrade to lower-middle income status and looming competition from an E.U.-Vietnam trade deal pose major risks to the country’s garment and footwear export industry, a European business representative said on Thursday. ...

Two of the country’s biggest garment workers’ unions have asked the government to make factories give their workers three days of paid leave and provide loans for travel expenses to allow them to return to their hometowns to vote in the upcoming local elections. ...

Exports to the United States rebounded in the first quarter of the year, an increase of almost two percent on the same period last year, despite fears over protectionist trade policies to be ushered in by US President Donald Trump. ...

More than 1,000 garment workers from a factory in Kandal province’s Takhmao City blocked a public road on Wednesday in protest over unpaid wages that have left them struggling to afford food and pay their rents, a union official said. ...