Infrastructure
Rail Project In Need of More Funds
The rehabilitation of Cambodia’s dilapidated railway network is nearly six months behind schedule, and with more than a year’s worth of work to do, the project is running out of money, a consultant for the Ministry of Public Works and Transport said yesterday. Paul Power, a ...
Gov’t Reveals Chinese, Korean Railway Plans
The Chinese and South Korean governments have been granted permission to build 565 km of new railroad in Cambodia and have already conducted feasibility studies, according to a government report released yesterday. In its annual report, the Ministry of Public Works and Transport said that plans ...
Siem Reap proposed airport said to be on track
A senior government official has said construction on the US$1 billion airport project in Siem Reap was still on track despite the recent arrest of a key person in charge of the project. Plans and designs for the New Siem Reap International Airport had been submitted ...
First Trial Involving Minister’s Wife Commences
The first trial in a long-running land dispute with the wife of Industry, Mines and Energy Minister Suy Sem will start today at the Kompong Chhnang Provincial Court, a human rights worker and court officer said yesterday. Court prosecutor Penh Vibol confirmed that the court would ...
Toll trains said to stop March 31
Toll Group has informed the Cambodian government that it will suspend all railway operations and lay off half of its Cambodian staff at the end of the month, according to a source familiar with the situation. The Australian logistics firm, which in partnership with Royal Group ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012032055123/Business/toll-trains-said-to-stop-march-31.html
Toll Yet to Issue Statement On Railway Project Status
Several days after a report that Australian transportation company Toll Holdings would abandon its stake in a joint venture to operate Cambodia’s railway system, the company remained silent Friday on its future plans here. “Let’s wait for the truth rather than make assumptions,” he added. ...
As Plans for Dam Gain Traction, Villagers Balk
For hundreds of years, the ancestors of Vam Sovann have lived in Koh Kong province’s remote Araeng valley. Some 70 km from the nearest national road, Mr. Sovann’s village has no electricity or phone coverage, no paved roads or running water; instead, it has access ...
Toll Group Mum on Possible Rail Project Exit
Australian transportation solutions provider Toll Holdings remained silent yesterday on whether it would be pulling out of its 30-year contract to operate Cambodia’s railway system. In a report published on Tuesday, the Sydney Morning Herald cited “reliable sources in Cambodia” as saying that the company would ...
Royal Group Denies Toll’s Exit From Local Railway Project
Royal Group chairman Kith Meng yesterday denied reports that Australian company Toll Holdings would be pulling out of a $140 million joint venture project to rehabilitate Cambodia’s railway system. Toll Holdings, in a joint venture with Royal Group, signed a 30-year contract with the government in ...
Toll Group alleged to be leaving rail project
Australian logistics company Toll Group is allegedly pulling out of its 30-year concession to operate the Kingdom’s national railway, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. Citing “reliable sources”, an SMH report said Toll would leave its US$145 million Toll Royal Railway joint venture with Cambodia’s Royal ...
China to continue helping Cambodia with infrastructure
China will continue to help Cambodia with its infrastructure and raise living standard of its people, said Pan Guangxue, Chinese ambassador to Cambodia here Monday. Speaking at the inauguration ceremony of Cambodia’s 57 national road Battambang-Pailing section in Battambang, Pan said “The completion of the road ...
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2012-03/13/content_14820472.htm
In Cambodia, Lost Retreats Once Again Found
Kep province – On a sunny weekday in Kep, a seaside village about halfway along Cambodia’s coast, the crab market was heaving. Women in straw hats and rubber boots stood knee deep in the surf shouting out prices, periodically darting into the sea to pull writhing ...
More Than 250 Firms Hold Mining Licenses
Almost 200 mining companies currently hold government licenses to mine construction materials such as granite, or to extract minerals, while another 53 firms are licensed to explore for mineral wealth, according to a Ministry of Industry, Mines and Energy report released Friday. Among these firms, 47 ...
Cambodia grants mine exploratory licenses to 24 firms in 2011: gov't report
Cambodia’s Ministry of Industry, Mines and Energy had issued mineral resource exploratory licenses to 24 local and foreign companies in the past year. According to the annual report of the ministry’s mineral resources department released on Friday, the firms are mostly Cambodian-owned ones and those from ...
Xinhua
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90777/7753471.html
Protesters successful; water prices decrease
Authorities in Prey Veng province yesterday agreed to cut the price of water from 1,800 riel to 1,200 riel a cubic metre after more than 1,000 people blocked National Road 11 for the fourth consecutive day. Acting provincial police chief Dim Yarum said yesterday an ...
Six Months on, No Response to Experts’ Sesan Dam Letter
More than two dozen fisheries experts from across the world have sent a letter of concern to the prime minister and Council of Ministers warning that if construction of the Lower Sesan 2 dam goes ahead as planned, it would negatively impact hundreds of thousands ...
Appeal Court Upholds Guilty Verdict in Land Dispute
The Appeal Court on Tuesday upheld its own previous guilty verdict against a farmer from Kompong Chhnang province for defaming KDC, the agri-business firm owned by Chea Kheng, the wife of Industry, Mines and Energy Minister Suy Sem. Pheng Rom is a member of one ...
Lower Sesan 2 Dam Would be 'Catastrophic'
Hydropower dams planned for the tributaries of the Mekong River, particularly the Lower Sesan 2, will have a “catastrophic” impact on fish stocks throughout the country, according to new research that calls for several planned dams to be reconsidered. Authored by an international group of ...
Net widens on fishing trap ban
Less than a week after banning commercial fishing in Tonle Sap Lake, Prime Minister Hun Sen issued a sub-decree on Monday extending the ban to four provinces along the Mekong River. According to the sub-decree, signed March 5 and released publicly yesterday, commercial fishing will be ...
High Prices of Privatized Water in Prey Veng Lead to Protests
More than 1,000 villagers in Prey Veng city took to the streets in protest yesterday morning after a company that recently took control of the state-run water supply raised prices by 50 percent, from 1,200 riel, or $0.30, to $1,800 riel, according to residents and ...
Relocation fears for Siem Reap families
About 90 Siem Reap families have rejected what they say is a preliminary move by the provincial authority to have them moved off land declared part of Kulen Mountain National Park in 2002. The families, in Banteay Srei district’s Tbeng commune, said yesterday they had rejected ...
Cambodia Potential
The potential for investment in Cambodia certainly appears to be there, as the country’s location in Indochina affords much opportunity for cross-border trade with Thailand, Laos and Vietnam, says Mark Mobius. Mr Mobius, who oversees more than US $40 billion worth of investments as executive chairman ...
Villagers Appeal to Halt Stung Treng Dam
Eleven village representatives from Stung Treng and Ratanakiri provinces traveled to Phnom Penh yesterday to meet with National Assembly lawmakers and appeal for an end to the planned construction of the Lower Sesan 2 Dam. The hydropower project, funded by Vietnam Electricity, will flood tens ...
Gov't Opens Rivers to Sand Dredging
Nine companies have put in bids for the rights to dredge the lengths of the Mekong and Tonle Sap rivers and sell the sand for export, Water Resources Ministry officials said yesterday, noting that the dredging would be beneficial in terms of deepening the waterways. ...