News
Sugar posts 1st gain in 5 years as El Nino ends surplus
After four bitter years, sugar mills can look forward to sweeter prospects in 2016. Prices have rebounded 50% since reaching a seven-year low in August. Raw-sugar futures traded in New York posted a 5% gain for the year, their first annual advance since 2010. The market ...
Cambodians filling majority of hotel rooms this New Year’s
As the year-end festivities get into high gear, provincial tourism officials are reporting a sharp increase in Cambodians travelling to popular holiday spots across the country to ring in the New Year. The temple town of Siem Reap this year is seeing an increase in hotel ...
Anti-smuggling teams abolished: Commerce ministry
The government’s mobile task force teams, which aimed to clamp down on the country’s thriving illegal border trade, have been abolished, the Ministry of Commerce announced on 30 December. “All teams will stop, starting from today,” Than Win, the director of the Ministry of Commerce, told ...
Vietnam stalls policy that requires workers, employers to pay more for social security
Vietnam has delayed a new social insurance policy that aims to increase contributions to the country’s pension fund, following complaints from both businesses and workers. The policy, originally slated to take effect this January, is now waiting for further instructions from the labor ministry and relevant ...
Vietnam, partners look to sign Pacific-rim trade pact in February
The Vietnamese government expects to sign an agreement with 11 other nations in early February to finalize their negotiated terms of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, taking another step to turn one of the most ambitious trade pacts into reality. According to local media, Minister of Industry and Trade ...
Vietnam adds flesh to regulatory bones to court more investment
Vietnam has issued detailed regulations for foreign investors in 17 business sectors in a drive to improve the investment climate of a fast-growing country blighted by bureaucracy, but now seeing record inflows of foreign capital. The new list of sectors specifies foreign investment ratios, the scope ...
ASEAN bloc readies for integration
Significant changes are not expected with the formal launch of the ASEAN Community on 31 December as 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations still need more time to work out and adjust key issues for integration under the community’s three pillars: the ASEAN Political-Security Community, the ...
3,000 officers, metal detectors to secure New Year's Countdown
About 3,000 soldiers and police have been deployed to Bangkok’s Ratchaprasong area where walk-through metal detectors also were installed to secure the New Year’s Countdown site on 31 December. Keep reading ...
ASEAN's first rail-freight X-ray terminal opens in Chon Buri
The Customs Department has opened an X-ray scanning terminal for rail freight, the first of its kind in Southeast Asia, at the Laem Chabang port in Si Racha district of Thailand’s Chon Buri province. The opening ceremony was witnessed by chiefs of the department, the State Railway ...
Minister defends draft union law
Cambodia’s Labour Minister Ith Samheng made a lengthy defence of the draft trade union law on 30 December, claiming it would stabilise the Kingdom’s troubled labour relations, even as he pledged to find the “mastermind” behind recent protests in the Svay Rieng town of Bavet. Speaking ...
