News

Health officials and workers are concerned about budget shortages for the treatment of tuberculosis in the Kingdom as new data reveals that prevalence of the disease has declined 37 percent from 2002, officials said yesterday. Mao Tan Eang, director of the National Centre for Tuberculosis and ...

Panellists at the first “Permanent People’s Tribunal” on wages and conditions for Cambodian garment workers yesterday released their findings, declaring that a living wage for workers should be considered a “human right”. The hearing included two days of testimony by workers, labour experts and brand-name buyers. While ...

Investors in Cambodia, tied with Yemen as the world’s 164th-cleanest country for doing business, face risks in a planned stock market because of ineffective financial and legal systems, the country’s exiled opposition leader said. “Among the little dragons of Southeast Asia, Cambodia is the least encouraging,” ...

Chinese businessman Cha intor and president of coal mining group from China decided to invest the opening of Khmer economic magazine in Phnom Penh to boost the close ties for China and Cambodia and also it will enhance traditional media in the country. The announcement ...

U.S. and Japanese companies are interested in prospecting for oil and natural gas in Cambodia. According to Phai Siphan, state secretary and spokesman of the Council of Ministers Office, in the provinces of Preah Vihear, Siemreab, and Kampong Thom there are 17 oil blocs covering ...

Gasoline prices in Cambodia hit an all-time high on Friday, stoking fears of limited fuel reserves and increasing production costs at some of the Kingdom’s businesses. Premium gasoline sold for $1.40 per litre last week, surpassing the $1.38-per-litre price during the global economic slump at the ...

The Kingdom’s much-hyped deadline of tapping its first oil reserves by December 12 2012, or 12-12-12, will not be met, a government spokesman said yesterday. Chevron Overseas Petroleum (Cambodia) Ltd, which is now exploring the Kingdom’s offshore Block A in the Gulf of Thailand, has notified ...

Thai cassava farmers have asked Cambodia to stop exporting the commodity into Thailand in an attempt to keep prices high and avoid saturating the market, officials said yesterday. Sao Sarat, Pailin provincial cabinet chief, said that Thai government officials representing local cassava farmers met with Pailin ...

Ninety-five percent of factories in the country are issuing too much overtime, while more than 60 percent of factories are too hot, according to a report released yesterday by the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) Better Factories program. Both the excessive overtime and the hot working conditions ...

The last of the nearly 800 families from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak community who are in line for land titles will not receive their long-awaited ownership records for another “two or three weeks”, a city official said yesterday. The families were spared eviction at the hands ...

More people are buying furniture thanks to a growing construction sector and solid economic growth. Cambodia’s economy grew by 6.9 percent in 2011 and is expected to grow by 6.5 percent for the next two years, according to the Ministry of Economy and Finance. Meanwhile, the ...

Almost 120,000 Cambodians who illegally crossed into neighbouring countries in search of work were repatriated during 2011, new figures from the Ministry of Interior have revealed, prompting a senior ministry official to call for a re-evaluation of how Cambodian workers are treated abroad. Chou Bun Eng, ...

Nautisco Seafood Manufacturing Inc, a Canadian-Cambodian shrimp producer in Preah Sihanouk province, has accused the private equity fund Leopard Capital, one of its shareholders, of draining the company of its finances. In a statement released Friday, Nautisco said that Phnom Penh Municipal Court had ordered the ...

The US government is working with a Cambodian microfinance institution to finance $2.7million in loans to farmers and small- and medium-sized agro-businesses in Battambang, Kompong Thom, Pursat and Siem Reap provinces in order to improve their access to credit, the US Embassy said. USAid will work ...

Deputy Prime Minister Sok An has told Iran’s ambassador to Cambodia that once an oil refinery in the country is operational, Cambodia would be able to import crude oil from Iran and export refined oil products to China, the Council of Ministers said on its ...

Cambodia’s gross domestic product grew 6.9 per cent year-on-year in 2011, and is set to increase to 6.5 per cent this year, according to preliminary projections from the Ministry of Economy and Finance. Agriculture, which was hit hard by floods last year, climbed 3.3 per cent, ...

Dry-season rice farmers in some areas west of the Tonle Sap River and in eastern provinces are appealing to the government for help as the reservoirs they rely on for irrigation are drying up faster than usual, farmers and officials said yesterday. Officials at the ministries ...

More than 300 villagers from two districts in Kampong Speu province joined forces yesterday to protest in front of the provincial court over two land disputes, vowing to continue until authorities resolved them and released a mother of seven jailed last month after she had ...

The floodwaters may have receded, but their effects are far from over, with the government, NGOs and international donors saying yesterday they are still assessing the damage as they shift to long-term rehabilitation. Last November, Minister of Economy and Finance Keat Chhon said the government would ...

Low wages and a lack of occupational health and safety measures led to a mass fainting on Tuesday at a Phnom Penh garment factory that produces clothes for well-known brands Wal-Mart, Target and Reebok, according to a statement released by the Community Legal Education Center ...

Workers who were seen last week clearing forestland in Stung Treng province in preparation for the construction of the 400-megawatt Lower Sesan 2 dam have stopped their work after receiving an order to do so by the district governor, officials said yesterday. Sesan district governor Bou ...

Villagers in Kompong Thom province’s Sandan district said yesterday that they handed over 77 pieces of luxury wood, which they had seized from illegal loggers, to the Forestry Administration after they were threatened with arrest. Fed up with the perceived lack of government action against illegal ...

Human rights group Licadho raised the alarm yesterday over the increased use of armed force by authorities as they seek to suppress protests over Cambodia’s numerous land disputes. It noted that during the past two months, security forces have opened fire on villagers during three ...

Despite a 67 per cent drop in food imports to Cambodia in 2011, inflation in exporting countries drove an 18 per cent rise in the total value of the imports. Food imports fell from 769,993 tonnes in 2010 to 254,080 in 2011, while the total value ...