Industries
Manufacturing
Despite Denials, Levi’s Still Producing at SL Garment Factory
U.S. denim giant Levi Strauss continued to deny this week that its products are linked to the strife-torn SL Garment Factory in Phnom Penh, despite new photographs showing Levi’s trademark jeans stacked on benches at the plant in Meanchey district. The Singaporean-owned factory, which also produces ...
Dene-Hern Chen and Aun Pheap
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/despite-denials-levis-still-producing-at-sl-garment-factory-47389/
Anniversary marked by inaction
Six months after two of her co-workers were crushed to death when a storage level collapsed at the Wing Star Shoes factory in Kampong Speu, employee Yu Manith is noticing the cracks in a factory wall beginning to expand. Shortly after police rummaged through the ...
Shane Worrell and Mom Kunthear
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/anniversary-marked-inaction
Social Media Challenges ‘Official’ Version of Events
Seeing is believing—particularly in a country where the government controls the broadcast media and current affairs news, aired on pro-ruling party TV and radio, is often at odds with the country’s few independent media outlets. But in the aftermath of a violent clash between striking garment ...
Kuch Naren and Colin Meyn
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/social-media-challenges-official-version-of-events-47012/
Police Deny Responsibility for Shooting Civilians
Police on Wednesday denied any responsibility for the shooting death of a street food vendor after they fired live rounds during clashes with garment factory workers in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district on Tuesday, with a government spokesman saying the security forces can use “any means” ...
Lauren Crothers and Phann Ana
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/police-deny-responsibility-for-shooting-civilians-46937/
H&M tries exclusivity agreement
Clothing giant H&M is testing the garment production waters by entering into exclusivity agreements with factories in Cambodia and Bangladesh, according to a report from Bloomberg News yesterday. This means that Sweden-based H&M would buy all of the factory’s output. H&M, it seems, would still be ...
Daniel de Carteret
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/hm-tries-exclusivity-agreement
Koh Russey Resort to exhibit in Hong Kong
Cambodia’s Koh Russey Resort development project is aiming to attract large foreign investment by exhibiting in Hong Kong. The resort will showcase its properties and facilities at an exhibition from November 29 until December 1, according to the real estate company CBRE. Expert staff of all departments ...
Moeun Nhean
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/real-estate/koh-russey-resort-exhibit-hong-kong
Hun Sen Set to Weigh In on SL Garment Factory Dispute
Officials at the Ministry of Labor who mediated talks Wednesday between the management of SL Garment Factory and union leaders who have led a three-month-long strike at the factory said that they would send the results of the meeting to Prime Minister Hun Sen to ...
Khuon Narim and Colin Meyn
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/hun-sen-set-to-weigh-in-on%E2%80%88sl%E2%80%88garment%E2%80%88factory-dispute-46952/
Garment Workers Block Road, Protest for Higher Wages
There were major traffic delays along Phnom Penh’s Veng Sreng Boulevard in Pur Senchey district Wednesday after about 200 garment workers from the Alim Cambodia Co. Ltd. garment factory formed a gated roadblock and protested for higher wages. A line of halted container trucks stretched for ...
Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/garment-workers-block-road-protest-for-higher-wages-46954/
Hun Sen’s Sister Linked to Private Security Firm at SL Factory
The younger sister of Prime Minister Hun Sen is the owner of a private security firm that has been hired to protect the SL Garment Factory from its workers, who have been on strike for more than three months, officials at the firm said Wednesday. Hun ...
Aun Pheap
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/hun-sens-sister-linked-to-private-security-firm-at-sl-factory-46946/
Cambodian police send 2 suspects to court after deadly clash in garment protest
The Phnom Penh Municipal Police on Wednesday sent two suspects to court with the charges of ” vandalism and causing injuries on police” in a Tuesday’s clash between the police and protesting garment workers, which resulted in the death of a woman and several injuries. Eang ...
Global Times News Staff
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/824631.shtml#.UoQswPlgd8E
Strikers, police clash
A woman was killed and at least six others shot yesterday morning when police fired live ammunition into a crowd of hundreds of rioting garment workers in the capital’s Stung Meanchey district. UN reports said police also arrested 37 people, including seven monks, as a result ...
Sean Teehan, Mom Kunthear and Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/strikers-police-clash
At Embattled Factory, an Unmovable Manager
In an industry rife with labor strikes, the workers at the SL Garment Factory in recent months have been strident, and sometimes violent, in their efforts to have their demands for better working conditions met by factory bosses. Tuesday’s clash with police near Phnom Penh’s Stung ...
Aun Pheap and Colin Meyn
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/at-embattled-factory-an-unmovable-manager-46900/
UK: Cambodia worker health part of M&S Plan A progress
UK retailer Marks & Spencer (M&S) is trialling a new campaign aimed at helping 14,000 garment workers in Cambodia deal with common health issues, as part of its Plan A ethical programme. The company, which aims to become the world’s most sustainable major retailer by 2015, ...
Katie Smith
http://www.just-style.com/news/cambodia-worker-health-part-of-ms-plan-a-progress_id119714.aspx
Law Aimed at Protecting Local Products Approved
The Council of Ministers has approved a draft law aimed at protecting the patent rights of traditional Cambodian products, which if violated could be met with a fine of up to $5,000 and a five-year jail term. The law on geographical indication (G.I.), a status given ...
Hul Reaksmey and George Styllis
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/law-aimed-at-protecting-local-products-approved-46855/
US Ambassador Advises More Labor Skills as Asean Integrates
US Ambassador William Todd on Thursday urged the Cambodian government to strengthen the skills of its laborers, in order to meet the needs of an integrated Asean in 2015. The 10 Southeast Asian countries that comprise Asean are all moving toward an integrated economic block, which ...
Kong Sothanarith
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/us-ambassador-advises-more-labor-skills-as-asean-integrates/1785729.html
Cambodia's garment export surges 24 pct in first 10 months
Garment industry, Cambodia’s largest income maker, reported a 24 percent rise in exports in the first ten months of 2013, according to figures of the country’s Ministry of Commerce Thursday. The figures showed that the country exported garment products in equivalent to 4.76 billion U.S. dollars ...
Xinhuanet News Staff
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/business/2013-11/07/c_132867226.htm
‘Ban’ for three more unionists
Three more unionists have been suspended as a result of the violent strikes at a Kampong Speu garment factory in May and June, a Free Trade Union official said yesterday. Sabrina (Cambodia) Garment Manufacturing factory’s FTU president Sun Vanny, vice-president Sem Sopheak and general secretary Chi ...
Mom Kunthear and Sean Teehan, P.6
http://www.phnompenhpost.com
World Bank Says Freeze on Lending Remains
After repeatedly equivocating about whether it has lifted a 2011 freeze on new lending to Cambodia in response to the government’s forced evictions of families in Phnom Penh, the World Bank has said that the suspension is still firmly in place. “The World Bank has not ...
Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/world-bank-says-freeze-on-lending-remains-46681/
Audi to cruise into local market
German luxury car manufacturer Audi has expanded into Cambodia, joining the recent entry of higher-end automobile producers into a small but growing market. At a signing ceremony in Phnom Penh yesterday, Audi AG appointed Automotive Asia (Cambodia) Ltd as its official distributor in the country. The ...
Anne Renzenbrink
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/audi-cruise-local-market
SL strike ‘bad’ for industry’s rep, says union
A labour union representing a minority of workers who have been striking at SL Garment Processing (Cambodia) Ltd for nearly three months released a statement yesterday, calling the strike bad for the industry’s reputation. Without specifically mentioning the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers’ Democratic Union (C.CAWDU) ...
Mom Kunthear and Sean Teehan
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/sl-strike-%E2%80%98bad%E2%80%99-industry%E2%80%99s-rep-says-union
New hope for SL strike resolution
With union and company officials at one of Asia’s largest garment factories making no progress in resolving a strike that has lasted nearly three months, a pair of labour relation groups are working on an agreement that all sides hope will end the deadlock. officials from ...
Sean Teehan and Mom Kunthear
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/new-hope-sl-strike-resolution
Sales of Korean energy drink explode in Cambodia
Cambodia last year accounted for 24 percent of the overseas sales of Bacchus, an energy drink marketed by South Korea’s Dong-A ST, Korea IT Times reported Monday. “By the year’s end, the company expects it would sell 100 million cans of Bacchus, about eight cans per ...
The Cambodia Herald Staff
http://www.thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=13&token=ZWU4YTU1NzlhMTM
Fears SL strike could get ugly
Union officials fear violence that occurred at two separate rallies in front of the SL Garment Processing (Cambodia) Ltd factory last week will continue at one scheduled this morning. About 10 SL strikers were injured during demonstrations on Thursday and Friday, when uniformed and plain-clothes SL ...
Sean Teehan
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/fears-sl-strike-could-get-ugly
CAMBODIA: H&M calls for annual minimum wage review
The Cambodian government should construct an effective annual review system for the minimum wage to ease worker unrest, according to clothing retail giant H&M. The Swedish company’s comments came after CEO Karl-Johan Persson visited the country in mid-October, meeting Cambodia Prime Minister Hun Sen and other ...
Richard Woodard
http://www.just-style.com/news/hm-calls-for-annual-minimum-wage-review_id119576.aspx