The Cambodia Daily
Decision Pending in Dispute Between Villagers, Businesswoman
Farmers in Kompong Chhnang province locked in a land dispute with a local businesswoman are waiting for the government to make a decision on who owns the property after student volunteers measured the area earlier this month as part of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s nationwide ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/decision-pending-in-dispute-between-villagers-businesswoman-20022/
Families Ordered to Leave Disused Airfield Land in Preah Vihear
More than 25 families living on the site of the long-disused airfield in Preah Vihear province have been ordered to move off the land, a district official said yesterday. “The authorities are forcing residents to leave without compensation and this eviction is illegal because they ...
Union Plan Massive Demonstration in Phnom Penh
Four of Cambodia’s independent and opposition-aligned unions have informed the Phnom Penh municipality that they plan to gather 20,000 people on May 1 to march from Olympic Stadium to the National Assembly. ...
In Mondolkiri Province, Asian Wild Elephants Are Thriving
New York-based organization Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) has released some remarkable footage of wild Asian elephants in Mondolkiri’s Seima district that offers a rare view of the endangered species in its natural habitat. ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/in-mondolkiri-province-asian-wild-elephants-are-thriving-19970/
Construction Sector Faces Chronic Labor Shortage
Cambodia’s construction sector is facing a massive labor shortage due to a recent boom in construction projects throughout the country and workers migrating en masse to Thailand in search of higher wages. In 2012, the construction sector expanded rapidly with the total value of approved projects ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/construction-sector-faces-chronic-labor-shortage-19742/
Villagers Protest Eviction by Chinese Company
More than 100 villagers living on a 20-hectare swath of a rubber plantation in Ratanakkirri province gathered outside O’Chum commune hall yesterday to protest their eviction at the hands of a Chinese company, local officials and rights activists said. About 120 families from Trang Churng Village ...
Poipet Casino Grand Opening set for Next Month
U.S. listed gambling firm Entertainment Gaming Asia Inc. (EGA) will next month hold a grand opening for its second casino on the Thai-Cambodia border, the company said. In a statement issued on Monday from Hong Kong, it said that Dreamworld Club in Poipet, which has been ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/poipet-casino-grand-opening-set-for-next-month-19965/
Google Launches Khmer Translation Service
Internet search giant Google on Friday launched a new service that for the first time allows users to instantly translate Khmer script into other languages. Khmer is the most recent addition to the 66-strong collection of languages between which words, sentences or whole websites can be ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/google-launches-khmer-translation-service-19417/
Luxury Wood Haul Found on Rubber Concession
Authorities in Ratanakkiri province arrested and charged two men with illegal logging after discovering about 4,000 pieces of luxury wood on an economic land concession held by a Vietnamese rubber company, officials said. [Deputy Provincial Forestry Administration Chief Phan Phoeun] said that although the wood ...
Land-Titling Project Denied Minorities of Property Rights
Hundreds of indigenous minorities in Ratanakkiri province are being made worse off by Prime Minister Hun Sen’s land-titling scheme which, rather than securing their property rights, is contributing to the loss of their ancestral lands, according to a new report. The report supports complaints aired since ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/land-titling-project-denied-minorities-of-property-rights-19528/
Phnom Penh Municipal Court Overturns Mfone Injunctions
The Phnom Penh Municipal Court has overturned two injunctions filed against bankrupt mobile operator Mfone, saying the decision will help the court-appointed administrator in charge of Mfone’s assets pay back creditors the money they are owed. The court issued Eltek’s injunction in October and Huawei’s ...
Adhoc Investigator Under Investigation for Inciting Protest
Officials in Ratanakkiri province are investigating the provincial coordinator for rights group Adhoc for incitement after he helped villagers organize a demonstration, ultimately canceled, against a Vietnamese rubber company in O’Yadaw district. Mr. [Chhay] Thy, [Adhoc’s Provincial Investigator] said yesterday that he met with about ...
Cambodia growth to continue, but development faces shortfalls
Despite steady economic growth in recent years, Cambodia remains one of the least-developed countries in the Asia-Pacific region and faces the challenge of diversifying its economy and moving up the production value chain, the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) ...
Lauren Crothers, P. 20
http://The Cambodia Daily
Firm to Develop Gold Mine in Ratanakkiri
A subsidiary of Indian firm Mesco Steel has arrived in Cambodia to begin developing a gold mine in Ratanakkiri province, according to an investor involved in the deal. Mesco Gold has paid a fee of $1.2 million to Canada-listed exploration firm Angkor Gold to develop a ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/firm-to-develop-gold-mine-in-ratanakkiri-19319/
World Bank Blocks Firm After Cambodia Project Probe
A bribery investigation by the World Bank has discovered misconduct by a major Canadian construction firm that was awarded a $5 million contract to help expand access to electricity in rural Cambodia, the bank said. In December 2009, SNC-Lavalin announced that it has been awarded ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/world-bank-blocks-firm-after-cambodia-project-probe-19199/
IMF Says Cambodia’s Economic ‘Takeoff’ Not Yet Sustainable
Government action will be needed to ensure that nearly two decades of impressive economic growth continues in Cambodia, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a report published Wednesday. In its 2013 World Economic Outlook, the IMF put Cambodia’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth for 2012 ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/imf-says-cambodias-economic-takeoff-not-yet-sustainable-18880/
Pepper Crop in Kompong Cham Hit by Hot Weather
As this year’s pepper harvest gets under way, farmers in Kompong Cham province are expecting lower yields due to severe hot weather in recent months. Yin Sopha, executive director of the Dar Memot Development Agriculture Pepper Cooperative, said the hot weather and lack of rain ...
Tate & Lyle Defends Sugar Plantation Deal In Koh Kong
A U.K. firm being sued by 200 Cambodian farmers over the loss of their land to two sugar plantations has defended its business dealings, claiming that the affected families were dealt with legally and were properly compensated for the loss of their properties. Local farmers ...
Firm Announces Rice Energy Plan in Cambodia
A U.S.-based energy company has announced that it is planning a biomass project using genetically modified rice in Cambodia, in a purportedly massive deal about which little information has been made public. In a statement posted online Thursday, Sino Bioenergy Corp. said it had signed a ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/firm-announces-rice-energy-plan-in-cambodia-19105/
Koh Kong Sugar Firm Makes Offer to Return Disputed Land
The Thai owners of a pair of sugar plantations in Koh Kong province accused of forcing hundreds of farmers off their land will give the land back if it can be proved that those evicted legally own the land, rights workers and a village representative ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/koh-kong-sugar-firm-makes-offer-to-return-disputed-land-18770/
Hun Sen Reaches for Ambitious Income Target
Going by the World Bank’s method of grouping nation states by their wealth, Cambodia this year could become a lower-middle income country. Not satisfied, however, with this graduation—a feat in itself from Cambodia’s position of extreme poverty just two decades ago when gross domestic product (GDP) ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/hun-sen-reaches-for-ambitious-income-target-18766/
ILO Says Fire Safety Measures Lacking in Garment Sector
Cambodia’s garment industry is experiencing a worrying rise in fire safety violations as factories struggle to cope with a sharp increase in the number of orders they are receiving, the International Labor Organization’s (ILO) Better Factories Cambodia program (BFC) said in a report on Thursday. The ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/ilo-says-fire-safety-measures-lacking-in-garment-sector-18628/
Creditors, Court in Dispute over Mfone Case
A court administrator and creditors who have filed complaints against bankrupt mobile operator Mfone are at loggerheads over whether or not to overturn two injunctions filed against the firm to stop it selling off its assets. “The judges are now considering to drop the injunctions because ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/creditors-court-in-dispute-over-mfone-case-18654/
Farmers Sue UK Sugar Firm For Millions
Hundreds of Cambodian families are suing the British sugar firm Tate & Lyle in one of the U.K’s highest courts over a pair of plantations in Koh Kong province they accuse of violently forcing them off their land and out of their homes. The British law ...