Japan building Mekong supply chain
Greater connectivity between Japan and Cambodia is tightening economic links between the two countries while catalysing Japan’s ambitions to develop a chain of industrial complexes that cut a tract through the Lower Mekong region. Officials at Japan External Trade Organisation, Japan’s development agency, say Cambodia’s economic attractiveness lies in its low-cost labour and geographical location, lying along the east-west economic corridor between Thailand’s industrial heartland and the Vietnamese container port of Cai Mep. Japanese firms are building factories and industrial parks along the corridor to feed the increasingly complex supply chains of goods manufactured for consumer markets in Asia and the West – and eventually Cambodia itself. “Cambodia is starting to become the focus of Japanese investors because of its location between Thailand and Vietnam, and it is a good location to manufacture here and then export to other countries,” explained Masashi Kono, chief representative of JETRO in Cambodia.
