Their stories have become all too familiar – Cambodian fishermen enslaved on fishing boats after being promised lucrative jobs overseas. They’re also becoming increasingly common.
Anti-trafficking NGOs told the Post this week that they have noticed an exponential increase in the number of trafficking complaints from fishermen trapped abroad.
In the past two years, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) aided in the repatriation of just over 100 Cambodians. But in just the first five months of 2013, the IOM has assisted in the return of 63 Cambodians – mostly from Malaysia, Indonesia and Mauritius. …
Two weeks ago, Taiwanese national Lin Yu Shin, 53, was arrested in Siem Reap on charges of trafficking Cambodians onto Taiwanese fishing trawlers off the coast of Africa.
According to the Association of Cambodian Recruitment Agencies, Lin’s company – Giant Ocean International Fishery – had already been operating for several years before it obtained its Ministry of Labour licence in 2009, and was part of a bigger network that dealt with partners in Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
The Community Legal Education Centre (CLEC), estimates the company trafficked some 1,000 Cambodians. …
Officials and business people say solar panels are gaining in popularity in rural areas, where the power grid does not reach.
Mao Sangat, director of Solar Energy Cambodia, told the Post yesterday that his company saw increases of installation of solar power systems for families whose children worked abroad and remitted money to their parents.
He said that so far, there were no huge projects to equip solar panel systems in public places such as schools or hospitals in rural areas supported by NGOs, but solar panels were selling well to families in three provinces – Kampong Cham, Prey Veng and Svay Rieng. …
Yiang Tal, chief of administration of Rural Electrification of Cambodia, said Electricity of Cambodia (EDC) provided $4 million for the Department of Rural Electrification Fund (REF) this year for providing loans to villagers and private electricity providers for implementing rural electricity development. …
He said that more than $1 million had gone to providing loans to private electricity providers to connect lines to rural homes, and all the connected families were required to pay back over two or three years without interest charges. …
The National Assembly of Cambodia on Friday ratified the agreement on maritime transport between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and China, saying the agreement is essential to develop trade and economic ties between ASEAN and China. …
“The agreement aims to facilitate and foster cooperation in passenger and cargo transport by sea among the signatories,” Nin Saphon, Chairwoman of the National Assembly’s Commission on Public Work, Industry, Mines, Energy, Commerce, and Land Management, said during the session. …
The Cambodian government has denied any agreement was signed to send women to Qatar to work as domestic workers, an official from the Labour Ministry said this week.
The denial comes after a report late last month by Qatari newspaper Gulf Times – which said an MoU had already been signed between the two countries – according to Labour Ministry Recruitment Department director Fawaz al-Rayis. …
Qatari officials, however, said that not only was a deal inked, but a monthly wage of $250 set. That minimum wage would be markedly lower than what Cambodian maids make in other foreign countries. In contrast, a new pilot programme that will send Cambodian maids to Singapore in July will pay them about $360 a month.
The Ministry of Commerce has released figures showing Cambodia’s export of fishery goods including fresh and dried fish products have decreased drastically in the first quarter of the year, though several government officials viewed the figures with scepticism.
Cambodia exported 49.9 tonnes of fish products in the first quarter of the year a sizable drop from the 620.14 tonnes exported over the same period in 2012, the ministry’s data showed. …
Om Savath, executive director of Cambodia’s Fish Action Coalition Team, said that in general fishery production had declined this year, as the government had reduced the number of fishing lots throughout the country. …
Cambodia imported 412,190 tons of Crude Oil in Q-1 of Y 2013, a 12% fall compared with the 471,000 tons it imported at the same period last year, the Commerce ministry’s report showed Saturday.
During the January-March period this year, the country spent US$ 397-M to buy its Crude Oil down 15% from US$469-M at the same period last year, it said. …
On 8 April, during the official visit of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen to China, Hun Sen and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang witnessed a signing on a Memorandum of Understanding MOU on a 5-M tons Crude Oil refinery project among China Development Bank HK:1062, China Export and Credit Insurance Corporation, China Perfect Machinery Industry Corporation and Cambodian Petrochemical Company. …
Group Lease has decided to raise the capital of its wholly owned Singaporean subsidiary Group Lease Holdings to serve as the main funding source for its Cambodian motorcycle leasing operations after six months of satisfactory trial operations there. …
Cambodia, which is managed by Group Lease’s wholly owned subsidiary GL Finance, will increase its accounts to 1,000 next month and 2,000 next quarter as planned. …
To ensure that the financial resources for the Cambodian operations are adequate and to comply with the National Bank of Cambodia’s regulations on capital sufficiency, the registered capital of the Singapore unit will be raised from 3 million Singapore dollars (Bt69.75 million) to S$4.6 million, while paid-up capital will increase from S$757.500 to the full S$4.6 million, according to a filing to the Stock Exchange of Thailand. …
Cambodian garment exports are expected to grow in 2013 with the increasing foreign investments along with focus on new market including Japan and China, according to the Garment Manufactures Association of Cambodia (GMAC). In 2012, apparel exports of Cambodia grew nine percent to US$ 4.61 billion as compared to exports worth US$ 4.24 billion in 2011. …
Singapore, the US, Malaysia, Japan, Thailand, Australia, England and India were some other countries that invested in Cambodian apparel sector in 2012. However, ongoing economic crisis in the traditional export markets such as the US and the EU coupled with numerous strikes are slowing export growth of Cambodia. …
When the owner of Kingsland garment factory fled the Kingdom last year, enough pressure was applied to its sourcing companies H&M and Walmart to persuade them through their intermediaries to compensate workers left jobless. Distance could no longer absolve them of responsibility.
Just like the Kingsland employees who took their protest to the US and Swedish embassies to lobby Walmart and H&M, former Mfone employees took their protest to the Thai and Singapore embassies last week to apply pressure on the parents of the failed Cambodian company. …
For Dave Welsh, country director for the American Centre for International Labour Solidarity, companies that are inextricably linked to failed organisations should also be held to account. …
“Look at the corporation as whole, not just at Mfone. Look at the corporate links in Singapore and Thailand,” Welsh said. “The analogy of the situation is H&M and Nike aren’t incorporated in Cambodia, but they are morally, if not legally, on the hook for things that happen in their factory.” …
Cambodia’s Royal Group of Companies is in negotiations to purchase a satellite from China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation for its telecoms operations in Cambodia, Cambodian Minister of Commerce Cham Prasidh said Wednesday. …
Tycoon Kith Meng currently owns the kingdom’s largest mobile phone operator, Mobitel. In April 2011, the government of Cambodia signed a concessional contract to grant his company to study and prepare for the launching of a communications satellite.
Under the contract, the company will take three years to study and prepare for launching Cambodia Satellite-1 in order to serve phone, broadband Internet and broadcasting services and other sectors. …
Cambodia ranks last in travel and tourism competitiveness among eight Southeast Asian countries, according to a recently published study by the World Economic Forum.
The Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Report 2013, which excluded Laos and Myanmar, said Cambodia comes 106th out of 140 countries this year, compared to placing 109th in 2011.
While the number of international tourist arrivals in Cambodia is increasing, the sector is still lacking a regulatory framework, an effective business environment and infrastructure, as well as human, cultural and natural resources, the report said. …
Plans are in place for a new $10 million international airport on Koh Rong island, but questions remain as to when construction would commence and when funding would be available.
Designs for the roughly 7,200-square-metre airport terminal, which will consist of Khmer- and resort-style architecture, were completed two years ago, said Edward Billson, managing director of MAP Architects, a Hong Kong-based firm that is handling Koh Rong’s master plan. …
The airport is part of the first phase of Koh Rong’s development plans, which also includes establishing luxury resorts. With 28 beaches, Koh Rong has been billed as Asia’s next big island destination. …
Royal Group was granted a 99-year lease in 2008 from the government to develop the 78-square-kilometre island, along with its partner, Hong Kong real estate company Millennium Group. …
E. Sun Commercial Bank (玉山銀行), the banking arm of E. Sun Financial Holding Co (玉山金控), yesterday announced plans to buy a 70 percent stake in Phnom Penh, Cambodia-based Union Commercial Bank PLC (UCB) for US$69.33 million to facilitate its expansion into Southeast Asia.
“We decided to buy a stake in UCB, rather than set up a branch in Cambodia after discovering that USB shares similar ideas about business development with E. Sun Bank,” E. Sun Financial president Joseph Huang (黃男州) told reporters at the Taiwan Stock Exchange. …
A delegation of 15 Indian firms is in Cambodia this week looking to increase the country’s involvement in Cambodia’s economy, particularly in the agriculture and mining sectors.
At present, Cambodia does modest trade with India, the second largest country in the world by population. But the Indian firms visiting Cambodia–after also visiting Laos and Burma-are making a bid to change that.
“Today, India’s trade with Asean is $80 billion a [year] and we do $100 million with Cambodia,” Indian Ambassador to Cambodia Dinesh Pattnaik told a seminar in Phnom Penh yesterday. …
D&D Pattnaik Group Ltd., of which Mr. Pattnaik is CEO, is already exploring for gold in Kratie province and bauxite in Mondulkiri province, Mr. Pattnaik said. …
CAMBODIA’S indirect trade and investments with India are possibly worth almost five times more than its direct economic activities, a situation deemed “unfavourable” to the country, an industry expert said yesterday.
Direct trade and investments between the two countries hit a record $112 million last year, 20 per cent more than 2011, said Indian Chamber of Commerce’s (ICC) President, Debasish Pattnaik.
But indirect activities, conducted through a third-party, “could be easily worth around $500 million,” said Manish Singhal, assistant secretary-general of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI). …
While India also largely trades indirectly with countries like Myanmar and Vietnam, Cambodia’s ratio of direct versus indirect activities is “very, very unfavourable”, Singhal said.
Without a middleman, there is “greater possibility of business growth”, he said, because importing costs can drop eight to 15 per cent. Also, when problems arise, having direct connections with the exporter would enable better solutions, because “the middleman is not your friend”, he added.
Such indirect activities, said Dinesh Pattnaik, is one reason why India’s direct trade and investments with Cambodia remain low, compared to that with ASEAN, valued currently at about $80 billion. …
The Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP) has submitted a new law to the National Assembly for consideration that would institute a minimum monthly wage of $150 for garment workers and $250 for civil servants, the newly formed opposition party announced at a press conference yesterday.
The minimum-wage draft law, as well as a second proposed law that would see the creation of agricultural cooperatives were sent to the National Assembly on Wednesday, said Son Chhay, party whip of the Sam Rainsy Party- which last year merged with the Human Rights Party to form the CNRP and challenge the ruling CPP in July national elections. …
Mr. Chhay said that funding for the increased salaries for garment workers and government employees would come from higher taxes on casinos and economic land concessions. …
While the Government mandates a $61 minimum wage for garment workers, there is no specified equivalent for civil servants, who are largely exempt from the country’s labour laws. …
Property experts say foreign companies are coming to invest in Cambodia’s property sector, as they see the growth and potential of the Kingdom.
Sung Bonna, director of Bonna Realty Group, said that the number of foreign companies in the sector has grown, and most are from South Korea, Japan, China, Singapore and Malaysia. …
“The property investment companies growth rose a little bit during 2011-212 as it grew better during 2012 and early in 2013”, Bonna said, “After Cambodia hosted the Asean Summit, with world leaders joining the meeting, we see the inflow of foreign investors into Cambodia, but some of them, at the moment, have been doing research and considering about the possible investment in Cambodia”. …
Total fixed assets of Singaporean investment in Cambodia last year reached $82.7 million, a 500 per cent increase from $13.8 million in 2011, data from the Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC) show.
Singaporean entrepreneurs who have already entered the Cambodian market said they expect more Singaporeans to follow. Despite the increase in investment in the country, Cambodia is still relatively new terrain for Singaporean businesses. …
According to last year’s investment data, Singapore invested in rice mills, rubber plantations, and garment and plastic bag factories.
The Channel News Asia’s report from February 14 said there are currently about 100 Singaporean-owned businesses in Cambodia.
Oil prices in Cambodia hit the highest of all time on Friday, with a liter of premium gasoline going for 1.45 U.S. dollars at all petrol stations in the capital.
The price is the highest ever if compared with the peak price of 1.41 U.S. dollars a liter in 2008 and once again in last March. …
Malaysia-based Hong Leong Bank, a subsidiary of Hong Leong Financial Group Berhad, is planning to open a branch in Cambodia sometime this year, which would make it the fourth Malaysian bank and the 33rd commercial bank in Cambodia’s crowded banking industry.
Ngoun Sokha, director general of the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC), confirmed yesterday that the bank had applied for a licence last year. …
Hong Leong Bank has been operating in Malaysia for more than 100 years. In 2011, Hong Leong Bank completed a merger with EON Bank Group. …
