News
Mass cattle deaths scar country’s northeast
There was little rain to settle the red dust in Krolah. The wells dried up. The cattle died. The people fell sick. The village, 30 km over steep hills from the provincial capital of Banlung—already hit by rampant deforestation—bore the brunt of the harshest drought in ...
Rice industry body president gets wary vote of confidence
Cambodia’s apex rice industry body held its annual general meeting on 2 July, with its members unanimously re-electing its well-connected incumbent president, Sok Puthyvuth, for a second term in what some are calling a dress rehearsal for his political ascendancy. Puthyvuth, the son of Deputy Prime Minister ...
US spending bill ties aid to end of government ‘violence’
According to a Senate report accompanying the bill, the vast majority of the recommended budget for Cambodia, $69.9 million of it, would go toward health programs and development assistance. Most of the rest would go to military education and training, demining, anti-terrorism and related programs. ...
Mother nature activists released
The Koh Kong Provincial Court in Cambodia decided to suspend a year and a half sentence handed down to three activists from environmental NGO Mother Nature who have been in prison since last August – longer than the legal limit for pre-trial detention. The three ...
Health ministry warns of a spike in dengue
Large outbreaks of the mosquito-borne virus happen every three to five years. In February, the National Malaria Center observed that dengue cases reported in January were similar to those recorded in 2007 and 2012, when the country last saw dengue epidemics. Dr. Sovann said the ministry ...
ILO says factory conditions improving
The International Labor Organization said conditions in Cambodia’s garment factories have improved since it resumed identifying labor infractions at specific factories two years ago but noted significant ongoing problems in a report released on 1 July. The latest Synthesis Report, produced by the ILO’s Better Factories ...
Prey Lang still logged: community
Continued widespread logging in the Prey Lang forest is evidence that the government’s recent push to have more than 400,000 hectares of land protected is toothless, according to activists as well as a Prey Lang Community Network report released on 29 June. The report’s purpose was ...
NGO releases ELC figures to help with ‘shortcomings’
The NGO Forum on 28 June released an extensive and updated accounting of economic land concessions in Cambodia, suggesting that in a 20-year period, 267 ELCs totalling 1,532,783 hectares were granted. The data collection, from 1995 to the end of 2015, was conducted by the Research Advocacy ...
Officials bid to increase South Korean investment
A delegation of Cambodian investment officials and prominent private sector businessmen held a seminar in Seoul, South Korea, on 29 June in an effort to drum up more Korean investment in Cambodia’s growing agro-industrial sector. The Cambodian delegates briefed more than 80 Korean investors in attendance on ...
Worker traffic accidents down in ’16
The number of traffic accidents involving workers is down 28 per cent in the first six months of 2016 compared to the same period last year, Cambodia’s Ministry of Labour’s National Social Security Fund reported on 28 June. Accidents for 2016 through June totalled 2,259, with 2,849 ...
