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Service sector eyes AEC's pot of gold
Thai small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the auto services, logistics, software and medical tourism sectors are tipped to see massive growth opportunities once the Asean Economic Community (AEC) is set up. Industry Minister M.R. Pongsvas Svasti said Thailand’s service sector, which accounts for 30% of ...
http://www.bangkokpost.com/business/economics/309110/service-sector-eyes-aec-pot-of-gold
Cambodia, the next setting to a ‘Battle of the Rails’
As Australian operator Toll Royal Railways looks at a possible withdrawal from in Cambodia, a new China-backed company tries to take over and promise to rehabilitate more tracks including Phnom Penh-Saigon Toll Royal Railway won in 2010 a concession to operate and upgrade the Cambodian rail ...
http://www.traveldailynews.asia/news/article/50249/cambodia-the-next-setting-to
Strikes lead to cut in orders
Global brands Levi’s and Gap had slashed their orders from the Tai Yang and Camwell garment factories by 20 per cent, the factories’ boss said yesterday, amid the longest strike in the industry’s recent history. Tai Yang Enterprises manager Wu Minghuor said his company had shuttered ...
Vietnam needs more nuts
Cambodian cashew nut traders believe the market price for cashew nuts will increase, as demand from Vietnamese markets increases along with international demand. Vietnam’s domestic enterprise imported nearly 157,000 tonnes of raw cashew nuts in the first seven months of the year, mostly from Cambodia, ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012082458254/Business/vietnam-demands-more-cashew-nuts.html
Regional dams threat to fish: study
Thirteen percent of more than 2,500 freshwater species of fish, crabs and plants profiled across the region are under threat of extinction, a report released on Wednesday says. According to an International Union for Conservation of Nature study of freshwater biodiversity in the “Indo-Burma” region, which includes Cambodia, ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012082458270/National-news/regional-dams-threat-to-fish.html
US Extractive Firms Obliged to Disclose Overseas Payments
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has adopted rules that would make it a legal requirement for listed companies operating in the extractive industries and doing business in Cambodia to disclose all major payments they make to the government. The rules, which were adopted in ...
Cambodia Wants More Information on Taiwan's Heroin Haul
Police yesterday said they were seeking more information about a massive haul of heroin-allegedly transited through Cambodia-that was seized from a boat off the coast of Taiwan this week. The Taiwanese Justice Ministry’s Investigation Bureau says it found 70 kg of heroin hidden in a fishing ...
Tackling Tourism
Tourism authorities are concerned that the role of Siem Reap’s Cambodian tour guides catering to Korean tourists is being usurped by interpreters, with the tour guides being relegated to mere porters. This is mainly due to the lack of tour guides who can converse in the ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012082458277/Siem-Reap-Insider/tackling-tourism-issues.html
Conference focus on social enterprises
Cambodia’s second conference on social enterprise is set to take place tomorrow with the aim of tackling poverty, social exclusion and health and environmental problems, organisers say. The all-day conference, at the Cambodia-Japan Conference Centre at the Royal University of Phnom Penh, will facilitate discussions among participants ...
Mining Firm With Local Licenses Sees Investment
BlackRock Inc., the world’s largest investment firm, has purchased a multi-million dollar stake in a mining firm with a gold exploration licenses in Cambodia. Stephen Promnitz, CEO of Indochine Mining, which is listed on the Australian Stock Exchange and holds a gold exploration license in Kratie ...
ASEAN-US business summit next week
United States Trade Representative Ron Kirk, will spend two days, August 30 and 31, in Siem Reap attending the 44th ASEAN Economic Ministers’ meeting and the ASEAN-US Business Summit. He is also scheduled to meet separately with Cambodian leaders and other participating ministers to discuss bilateral ...
Clash, charges roil Ocean
More than 2,500 Ocean Garment factory workers jostled with about 100 military police in the capital’s Dangkor district yesterday in their second protest march over the alleged sexual harassment of four female employees. In an inter-governmental ministerial committee meeting on Tuesday, Ocean – which supplies ...
Seoul Court Releases CEOs Tied to Local Projects
The chief executives of two companies behind major developments in Cambodia-who were jailed in Seoul in February for their part in a major South Korean financial scandal-have been partially cleared and released, according to a court official. Lee Sang-ho – the CEO of World City Co. ...
Quote 'Out of Context' Says Women's Minister
Women’s Affairs Minister Ing Kantha Phavi said yesterday that comments she made in a radio broadcast last week, in which she appeared to blame female Boeng Kak protesters for bringing police violence on themselves, were taken out of context from a radio interview given some ...
Forest activists name names
Villagers who claim their patrols last week uncovered criminal activity in Prey Lang forest presented the government yesterday with a list of 15 people they say are illegally logging in the area. Reoun Sopheap, a representative of about 100 villagers from Kampong Thom province’s Sandan district, ...
Garment Workers Rally for Third Day to Sack Factory Manager
More than 2,00 female workers from a factory in Phnom Penh that makes clothes for the U.S. brand Gap protested yesterday for a third straight day demanding that the firm sack a manager at the factory for allegedly abusing workers. Lining Russian Boulevard near the Ocean ...
Another mass fainting, but H&M 'not to blame'
The second mass fainting in a month at Kampong Chhnang’s M&V garment factory, a supplier for global retailer H&M, saw 23 women taken to hospital yesterday, bringing the total number of affected workers in August to 67. Noun Sam Ol, president of the Free Trade Union ...
Thai Press Gives Conflicting Reports on Chams
Thai media reports yesterday offered conflicting information on whether members of Cambodia’s Cham community were joining a long-running Muslim insurgency in Thailand’s southern provinces. According to the [Bangkok] Post, General Prayuth said most of the Cambodian Muslims were traveling on to other countries in search ...
UN: invest in women
Cambodia needed to invest in women to aid its development and integration into the ASEAN economic community, United Nations Under Secretary-General Noeleen Heyzer said yesterday. Heyzer, executive secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific(ESCAP), met with Minister of Women’s Affairs Ing Kantha ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012082358228/Business/un-invest-in-cambodian-women.html
Cambodian farmers plant rice in a paddy field in Kampong Speu province
Cambodian farmers plant rice in a paddy field in Kampong Speu province August 21, 2012. A drought has hit Cambodia during its rainy season destroying more than 100,000 hectares of crops across the country, a government spokesman told Reuters on Tuesday. According to National Committee ...
UTCC: Rubber prices won't bounce back
Domestic rubber prices are likely to stay below 120 baht a kilogramme over the next five years due to the sluggish world economic outlook that has sapped demand. The lingering euro-zone debt crisis, weak growth in rubber-using countries and rising production in Asean will continue to ...
http://www.bangkokpost.com/business/economics/308754/utcc-rubber-prices-won-t-bounce-back
Firms Go to Arbitration Over Failed Gold Mining License Deal
Despite touting its Cambodian venture on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (FSE), a British registered mining firm’s plan to extract gold in Ratanakkiri province stalled and the firm may face legal action over a failed deal to obtain an exploration license. Astra Resources Plc. has also gone ...
Railway Family Payouts Could Be Increased
The government and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) will start drafting a new resettlement plan this month that could improve the compensation on offer for some of the roughly 200 Phnom Penh families losing their homes because of rehabilitation of the country’s railway network in ...
Preah Vihear land primed for plantation concessions
The government has reclassified 23,182 hectares of state land in Preah Vihear province for private development by three agro-industry firms, paving the way for them to secure economic land concessions (ELCs). Reclassification of state public land to state private land is a key step toward establishing ...