Cambodia expects 2008 growth of 7.3 percent - PM

Reuters

PHNOM PENH, Feb 28 - Cambodia's economy is expected to expand by 7.3 percent this year, a slower rate than in 2007 due to the pressure of high world oil prices, Prime Minister Hun Sen said on Thursday.

However, a blossoming private sector, overseas aid, sustained foreign investment and continued political stability should ensure healthy growth in the key garment, tourism, construction and agriculture sectors, he said.

"Cambodia needs to sustain this growth to catch up with and keep pace with neighbouring countries," Hun Sen said at a economic conference for international investors.

Cambodia's economy struggled during the 1990s to shake off the legacy of decades of civil war and upheaval, including the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge "Killing Fields".

However, it has taken off in the last few years, and expanded at an estimated 9.6 percent last year, making it one of the fastest-growing economies in the world.

Its gross domestic product is $8.4 billion, giving a per- capita annual income of more than $500.

The garment sector, valued at $3.8 billion last year, represents the lion's share of exports, a government report showed.

The Southeast Asian nation also received 1.7 million tourists last year and expects a 25 percent increase in 2008.

The report said reserves had increased by $600 million last year to $1.7 billion, but said the country ran a trade deficit of $1.5 billion, mainly due to the increase in value of petroleum imports.

Asian nations vie to become Cambodia's biggest foreign investors

Phnom Penh - China overtook South Korea as Cambodia's largest foreign investor last year, but Japan had shown an increased interest in investment as opposed to aid, a senior Cambodian economist said Wednesday. Speaking at a press conference in the capital, the secretary-general for the government's Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC), Sok Chenda, gently chided Western nations for lagging behind Asian nations in foreign direct investment. He said between 1994 to 2003 investment from Western nations made up just 15 per cent of the country's total, with 60 per cent coming from Asian nations such as Malaysia, China and Korea. "I can't predict foreign investment figures for 2008 but I hope for even more. Prime Minister Hun Sen just returned from a visit to South Korea yesterday and we are hopeful that will generate renewed investment interest there," Chenda said. "There is also new interest from other quarters, and especially Japan. Japanese investors have certainly now entered the doors of our home."Approved foreign investments from 1994 to 2007 totalled 14.83 billion dollars, he said, with China accounting for 1.76 billion dollars of that total and South Korea 1.5 billion dollars. Industrial investments made up 34 per cent of that total, followed by the service industry with 32 per cent. Agriculture made up just 7 per cent, but Chenda said that was a promising area of growth and with a boom in global bio-fuel demand and the recently launch of several food processing factories in Cambodia it was expected to continue to grow. However he admitted the less developed nation still faced obstacles, such as Cambodia's terrible balance of trade and lack of secondary industries, which meant container ships arrived full but often left with room to spare. He also appealed to foreign governments to help Cambodia strengthen its ability to curb money laundering, pointing out that the country lacked an investment board to investigate potential investors thoroughly, such as the boards set up in Thailand and Japan. "Competing regionally remains less than easy. Trading partners use the words 'friendly' and 'cooperation', but of course they always look after their own interests," he said.

Vietnam, Cambodia Discuss Expressway Project

PHNOM PENH, Feb 27 Asia Pulse - An expressway linking the southern Can Tho city of Viet Nam to Phnom Penh capital city of Cambodia will be built to facilitate the economic development in the two cities.

To this end, Vietnamese and Cambodian authorities met in Phnom Penh on February 26.

The future 230km highway is estimated to cost US$20 million per km in the form of BOT (Build-Operate-Transform). It will have 110km running on the Vietnamese land from Can Tho city via An Giang province to Phnom Penh .

The road is designed to be 35 m wide and have 6 lanes, with two more lanes likely to be added in the second phase.

The section on the Viet Nam territory has been approved by the government for construction.

The Can Tho-Phnom Penh Expressway, once completed, will link the Mekong delta rice bowl of Viet Nam with Cambodia and go over to Bangkok of Thailand, promoting the socio-economic development for the Mekong delta region in the countries.

Cambodian Secretary of State Tram Iv Tek said the project is big and important to his countrys socio-economic development so it will be proposed soon to the Prime Minister for instruction.

F社長インタビュー

　－－複写機を中心とするオフィス機器事業の見通しは

　「複写機の国内販売台数は伸び悩んでいるが、欧 州やＢＲＩＣｓ（ブラジル、ロシア、インド、中国）ではカラー化が進み、カラー機種を中心に輸出が拡大している。国内市場は成熟化しており個々の企業が抱 えた問題解決を図る『ソリューションサービス』と、新たな印刷領域である『プロダクション印刷』事業のように今後伸びが期待できる分野に力を注いでいく」

　－－北米景気の減速がダメージになりそうだ

　 「欧州やＢＲＩＣｓが堅調に伸びて北米の減少分を吸収しているが、楽観はしていない。原材料費の値上がりもあって先行きは不透明だ。複写機市場は価格下落 が進んでいて、原材料の値上がり分を製品に転嫁するのは難しい。リサイクル材料の再使用や工程自動化、少量のトナーで高画質印刷ができる省エネ技術の開発 が急務となる」

　－－プロダクション印刷事業の今後は

　「１枚ずつ内容を変えた印刷物を、早く、大量に印刷できるプロダク ション印刷のニーズは高い。企業のマーケティングでも顧客一人一人にあったダイレクトメールやチラシを送る手法が増えており、潜在的な市場も大きい。他社 の参入が本格化して驚異に感じてはいるが、それよりも、競争が激化して市場のパイが広がることに期待をしている」

　－－どう販売する

　「他社に先駆けて市場参入したことで、豊富な製品ラインアップや対応ソフトウエアを持っている。米ゼロックスと 連携した幅広い海外ネットワークを利用できるのも強みだ。大企業をメーンターゲットにしているが、中小企業向けに代行印刷し、製本、袋詰め、配送を一貫し て請け負うサービスも始めた。平成１８年度の売上高は１３００億円だったが、２４年度までには３０００億円に引き上げるつもりだ」

　－－消耗品のトナー需要は拡大している

　「今後は従来のトナーより消費電力が２０％削減できるエコタイプのトナーが主流になる。エコトナーは国内１拠点で生産しているが、供給が間に合わないほどだ。１７年に生産能力を増強したが、需要の伸びを考えれば、２年後には新たな工場が必要になりそうだ」

　－－Ｍ＆Ａ（企業の買収・合併）や提携についての考えは

　 「自社ですべてをまかなえるとは思っていない。今後、弱い部分を補うためにＭ＆Ａや提携に踏み切る可能性はある。例えば、金融系システムの構築に強みを持 つシステム会社や電力系に適したサービスを提供するソリューション企業などだ。きめ細かいサービスを幅広く構築するためで、真剣に考えたい」（西村利也）

Food inflation hits Cambodia's poor, threatens hunger

by Seth Meixner Mon Feb 25, 10:49 PM ET

CHRANG CHAMRES, Cambodia (AFP) - On the long, gently sloping bank of Cambodia's Tonle river, Doem Lao chops half a dozen large fish heads in the early morning for the one meal that her family will eat that day.

It is the 45-year-old farmer's fourth unseasonably cold dawn in this quiet Muslim neighbourhood on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, where her extended family has set up camp with others from their village in the southern province of Takeo.

Like tens of thousands of rural Cambodians, they have joined the annual migration to the river to buy enough fish to make a year's worth of prahoc, a pungent fermented paste that is the only source of protein for many in the country's impoverished rural regions.

But the rice brought they from home has nearly run out and the fish have yet to appear in the large nets strung across the river in front of their camp.

The crude bamboo and metal mesh processing stalls on the riverbank are silent -- and February is the last month of the fishing season.

A sudden drop-off in the numbers of prahoc fish has seen their price more than triple this year, up to as high as 50 US cents a kilogramme from around 12 cents, putting this most basic of Cambodian commodities out of reach for many.

While not normally a benchmark by which to measure food security, prahoc prices have highlighted the spiralling costs of staple goods that are threatening Cambodia's poorest with hunger.

"We eat prahoc every day. Last year we made so much that we could sell some or trade it for rice," Doem Lao said, sitting in a tight circle with other village women and a few young children, while their men stood further up the river bank smoking cigarettes in anticipation of another long day spent waiting.

"This year I'm not at all hopeful. Some of us have left already. We're not going to have enough prahoc. We're not even going to have enough rice," she said.

Across Asia the cost of food is rising, for a variety of reasons, from higher demand and spiking global oil prices to environmental factors like global warming which disrupt the normal agricultural cycles.

But while other regional governments have responded by cutting import tariffs or establishing national food stockpiles, Cambodia appears reluctant to step in and halt the continuing upward climb of food costs.

For poor Cambodians, this means that in addition to losing their traditional staples like prahoc, they are not able to supplement their already meagre diets with other foods, particularly meat.

"Everything now is so expensive," said another village woman, Bhum Sap, rattling off the current prices of chicken, pork and beef, which can cost as much as five dollars a kilogramme, a fortune for Cambodia's estimated 4.6 million people struggling to live on less than one dollar a day.

Cambodia, in some ways, has become a victim of its own economic success. The country has recorded economic growth averaging 11 percent over the past three years, spurred on by a galloping tourism sector and strong garment and building industries.

Growing interest by foreign investors and a real estate boom that has helped create more than a few overnight millionaires have resulted in an unprecedented explosion of wealth.

But the sudden influx of cash into the fragile economy has not come without its pitfalls.

Over the past year inflation has spiked at 10.8 percent, compared with 2.8 percent at the end of 2006, driving up the cost of food and other staple goods and pushing the most vulnerable deeper into poverty.

"About 8.5 percentage points of December's inflation rate of 10.8 percent was accounted for by food price inflation," said the International Monetary Fund's Cambodia representative John Nelms.

For as many as 2.6 million people living in extreme poverty, the situation has been worsening over the last several years, which have been marked by poor harvests brought on by natural disasters such as flood or drought.

"Too many Cambodians still suffer from hunger and malnutrition for some or most of the time," the World Food Programme (WFP) said on its website.

The unrelenting rise in food costs only adds more depth to their misery.

"WFP is very concerned about the general increase of the cost of the staples, in Cambodia as well as elsewhere," the agency's country director for Cambodia, Thomas Keusters, told AFP.

Food inflation has even affected aid efforts at a crucial time, as aid agencies anticipate the need for more handouts in rural areas facing a leaner than normal year ahead.

In January last year, the WFP paid 237 dollars per metric tonne of rice, a cost that has now risen to 367 dollars a tonne, Keusters said.

"For every dollar received from the international and local donor community, we buy 55 percent less rice. With the general increase in the cost of food, the need for food assistance will not decrease," he said.

"On the contrary. As Cambodia faces new challenges such as climate change, changes in food availability, high energy prices, globalization and many more, we all need to strategise better," he said.

DEVELOPMENT-CAMBODIA: Urban-Rural Divide Set To Widen

By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Feb 18 (IPS) - Phnom Penh’s skyline is set for a dramatic change, now that South Korean companies have confirmed plans to build two skyscrapers in the Cambodian capital. The 42-storey Gold Tower is scheduled to be completed by 2011, while a 53-storey structure will be ready the following year.

Such a transformation will invariably serve as visual symbols of the direction this nation has taken on the road to development. It will add to the impressive numbers Cambodia’s has recorded over the past two years, with the economy growing by 11 percent in 2006 and nine percent in 2007.

The likelihood of more tall towers wrapped in glass following these two appears possible. The South-east Asian country ‘’received more than 1,500 requests for construction projects worth 1.5 billion US dollars in the first nine months of 2007,’’ the ‘Phnom Penh Post’ newspaper reported recently, quoting Urban Planning and Construction Minister Im Chhum.

Yet such a picture only confirms why Cambodia is increasingly becoming a country with deep economic divisions, with the economic boom concentrated in only three urban centres -- Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville -- at the expense of its rural areas, where 80 percent of the country’s 14 million people live.

A new study by a U.N. agency lays bare the extent of food insecurity, high malnutrition and the ‘’food poor’’ in one of this region’s poorest countries still struggling to put behind it the nightmare of a brutal war and oppression that lasted over two decades. ‘’The mix of food products available in Cambodia should normally be adequate for a balanced diet, but productive capacity or purchasing power of many households is limited,’’ states the World Food Programme’s (WFP) ‘Food Security Atlas’.

Currently, close to 35 percent of Cambodians, or some 4.6 million people, live below the poverty line of one U.S. dollar a day. Of that, 90 percent come from rural areas, states findings by the WFP. ‘’In 2005, over 630,000, or 37 percent of Cambodian children aged under five years were suffering chronic protein-energy malnutrition ( or stunting),’’ adds the WFP, quoting figures from the Cambodian Demographic and Health Survey Report.

Cambodian’s classified as ‘’food deprived’’ amount to 21 percent of the population, close to three million people, states the WFP, drawing on the 2007 Food Insecurity Assessment, conducted by, among others, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation. The ‘’food poor’’ are those who eat less than the minimum diet to supply basic energy requirements.

The appearance of Siem Reap among the 10 provinces described as ‘’hot spots’’ due to ‘’high malnutrition rates’’ by the WFP in its mid-February study illustrates the two faces of Cambodia’s development story. For years, the city of Siem Reap has seen rapid growth, with many plush hotels coming up, to cater to the planeloads of tourists flying into the city. Its main draw: the majestic Angkor Wat and the surrounding temples built during the 14th century and before.

Yet the tourist dollars that have been pouring in have not trickled beyond the city’s borders. ‘’Siem Reap is one of the poorest provinces in the country,’’ Thomas Keusters, head of WFP’s Cambodia office, told IPS by phone from Phnom Penh. ‘’Tourism is only focused in the city. But only 15 miles away from the city centre, people are very poor.’’

The Cambodians left out from the city’s growth are those with little education in the province who cannot find jobs in the hotels, adds Keusters. ‘’The people who have found employment are those who can read and write and can help the tourism sector.’’

Cambodia’s weak education system beyond the main urban centres was highlighted Thursday in a report on education trends in the region released by the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). It has one of the ‘’highest repetition rates’’ of school children in the first grade, at 24 percent, revealed the ‘2008 Education for All Global Monitoring Report’.

In addition, Cambodia and Laos ‘’have the lowest early childhood care and education coverage in South-east Asia, with only nine percent and eight percent of children aged three to five enrolled in pre-primary school, respectively,’’ added the UNESCO study.

Even the World Bank admits that despite Cambodia’s success on some fronts -- such as reducing the number of people living in poverty from 47 percent of the population in 1994 to 35 percent a decade later -- inequality is a problem. During the past 10 years, the consumption power of the country’s richest 20 percent grew by 45 percent, as against an only eight percent rise in the consumption power of the poorest 20 percent, the Bank noted in its 2007 study of equity in Cambodia.

This economic divide exposes what ‘’growth rates do not show, about who is benefiting and who are the losers,’’ says Shalmali Guttal, a senior researcher at Focus on the Global South, a Bangkok-based think tank. ‘’The ordinary people in the rural and urban areas have been losing for years. There is a systemic problem in the distribution of resources.’’

The prospect of immediate change for the economically marginalised appears remote, she explained in an interview, because of the poor being deprived or denied access to land in the rural areas or even to fish in the country’s largest lake. ‘’Fishing concessions have been sold to private companies and the local fishing communities have a little catch, depriving them of income and their main source of protein.’’

Amnesty International (AI) is the latest human rights group to raise the alarm about the harsh measures used by the administration of Prime Minister Hun Sen to support a trend of forced evictions in the urban and rural areas to acquire land for commercial ventures and ‘’development’’ projects. It warned that 150,000 Cambodians are in danger of losing their homes and lands to projects that cater to the whims of the country’s wealthiest.

Vireak and Sopheap are just two people from a village of subsistence farmers near the coastal town of Sihanoukville who were affected last April, said the London-based rights lobby in a mid-February report. Most of the village ‘’was burned to the ground by law enforcement and military officers, forcibly evicting more than 100 families,’’ states AI.

‘’The Cambodian government has adopted policies, supported by international donors, aimed at developing and improving the lives of the poor. But such policies are in stark contrast to the realities experienced by Vireak, Sopheap and other victims of forced evictions, who sink deeper into poverty through the actions of the authorities,’’ added AI.

(END/2008)

カンボジア：都市と地方の格差が広がる

カンボジアは、プノンペンの開発などで近年、大きな経済成長を果たしている。一方で、国連の世界食糧計画（WFP）の最近の調査によると人口の３５％（４６０万人）が１日１ドル以下で生活する貧困層である現実もあり、特に都市と地方の経済格差が進んでいるという。

【バンコクIPS＝マルワーン・マカン・マルカール、２月１８日】

　プノンペンの空が大きく変容する。韓国の企業がカンボジアの首都に超高層ビル２棟を建設する計画を正式に発表した。４２階建てのゴールドタワーは２０１１年に、５３階建てのもう一棟はその翌年に完成する予定である。

　２００６年に１１％、２００７年には９％の経済成長率を示したカンボジアに、新たな発展のシンボルが加わることになる。「プノンペンポスト」紙による と、超高層ビルの建設計画が目白押しだ。だがカンボジアの開発はプノンペン、シェムリアップ、シアヌークビルの３都市に集中し、１４００万人の人口の ８０％が住む農村部は取り残されている。

　国連の世界食糧計画（WFP）の最近の調査によると、カンボジアはいまだに食糧不足、栄養失調で苦しんでいる。人口の３５％（４６０万人）が１日１ドル以下で生活する貧困層であり、そのうちの９０％が農村部に住んでいる。

　たとえばシェムリアップは数年で次々と豪華なホテルができて、１４世紀以前に造られたアンコールワットなどの名所に観光客が飛行機で訪れて急成長している。だが観光収入が都市の境界を越えることはない。２５キロ離れれば教育もなく職も得られない人々が貧困に喘いでいる。

　ユネスコの世界の教育に関する報告書「グローバルモニタリングレポート２００８」によると、カンボジアでは小学校の留年率が最も高く、２４％だった。またカンボジアとラオスは幼児の保育および教育の普及率が東南アジアで最も低く、就学前に教育施設に通う３～５歳児はそれぞれわずかに９％、８％だった。

　世界銀行もカンボジアの貧困削減の努力は認めながら、貧富の差が問題であるとしている。富裕層の購買力は４５％高まったが貧困層は１％でしかない。アムネスティ・インターナショナルはフンセン首相の開発プロジェクトの強引な進め方に警鐘を鳴らしている。開発のために居住地から強制的に立ち退かされ、さらにひどい貧困に陥る人々も多い。

　開発の進むカンボジアの貧困問題について報告する。（原文へ）

中国、カンボジア：経済特区建設で協力

2月23日にカンボジア最大となる経済特区、シアヌーク経済特区定礎式がカンボジア、シアヌーク市で開催された。この経済特区は中国とカンボジア両国が出資し、建設されるとのこと。

　現在、南国企業、興達泡塑、天繍紡織、利佳包装、申錫建築、漢神電気の中国企業6社が特区入りを果たした。

　シアヌーク経済特区は中国江蘇太湖カンボジア国際経済協力区投資有限会社と、カンボジア国際投資グループ開発有限会社の提携によって建設される。

　今後8年間で合計30億ドル（約214億元）を投資する見通し。

World Bank boss farewells Cambodia with warning on future growth

Indian born Nisha Agrawal arrived in Cambodia as country manager for the World Bank in April 2003 to find herself eventually thrust into the bank’s biggest ever confrontation with the government of Cambodia over corruption. The problems culminated in June 2006 in the dramatic ten month suspension of funds for three World Bank projects. The ban was lifted in February 2007, but the bank cancelled over $2.5 million in project funding and the government subsequently was asked to repay the World Bank $2.9 million. The bank has since hired Crown Agents, a British company, to handle procurement in their Cambodia projects. At the end of February, Agrawal will leave the World Bank after 18 years to go back to India and take the helm of a new NGO, Oxfam India. In an interview with the Post’s Susan Postlewaite on February 7, the director discussed the highs and lows of her five-year tenure at the Bank, which, with a budget of $50 million, is one of Cambodia’s most influential development partners.

What do you count as the accomplishments of your five years as country manager for Cambodia?

Four things. Firstly we have done a lot of research that has generated very useful knowledge about what is happening in the Cambodian economy. Before I came we really didn’t know whether the growth that Cambodia has seen in the last decade was having an impact on poverty or not. The Poverty Report was a very important piece of work by the World Bank to show that growth was actually benefiting poor people and that their lives were getting better off as a result.

Secondly, a very big thing is helping Cambodia agree on the priorities for reform and supporting the reforms that are happening.

Third, the way the development community works together has changed very dramatically and the World Bank has played a key role in bringing all the donors together around a common agenda. When I came here everybody had different priorities. We helped put in place a very elaborate architecture – 18 technical groups which meet and talk together with the government, with NGOs, with the development partners. We have quarterly meetings at senior levels of the government to discuss major policy issues.

Finally, the World Bank has built a very strong and large country office. When I came we were about five people and now we are 45 and most of these are Cambodian staff, and very high capacity staff.

What do you leave for your successor? What needs to be done?

During my five years, the economy has almost doubled in size, and government revenues have almost doubled in size. Foreign investment has taken off and is now larger than foreign aid for the first time. The challenge ahead is to ensure there’s also high quality development going on at the same time as a high growth rate. These would be the things my successor would focus on. Cambodia after ten years has been having an impact on poverty but only about one percent of the population is being lifted out of poverty per year. Vietnam is able to raise four percent of its population out of poverty each year. The difference is the emphasis that Vietnam has on agriculture.

The second challenge is how to make sure the growth is not coming at the cost of just cannibalizing your natural resources. One big choice the government faces is in the mining sector. How the government decides to do mining in the future will have a big impact on how sustainable it will be. These debates should happen very openly and transparently. Do Cambodians really want to be mining everywhere including in the national parks, or do they value their national parks?

A second choice is on how to manage the oil and gas revenues. That is a huge challenge. Suppose there are these large orders of magnitude that people are talking about. How they are managed would really make or break this country. If the government doesn’t use those revenues well, Cambodia could go down a very bad path where the revenues not only kill off other industry and employment, but corruption levels rise to such a level that everything else could fall apart.

The World Bank has come under heavy criticism – from The Wall Street Journal and others – for allowing corruption in its programs in Cambodia. Are you satisfied that you’ve corrected the problems?

We are making a huge effort to make sure that funds from our own projects don’t leak. Our projects are implemented by the government and supervised by us. The biggest problem was in the way procurement was done and who got the contracts. Because there were systematic problems in procurement, we are taking a two-track approach to deal with this issue: in the short-run, all procurement will be done by an independent procurement agent, while in the medium to long term, we will work with government to build and strengthen their systems.

Ultimately it should not be just about whether the World Bank money is leaking or not, but it should be about the country’s own spending. Our funds in this country are $50 million a year. What we would like to do is work with the government to improve their procurement and financial management system in the long run to make sure that the whole $1.2-billion budget is spent wisely.

In retrospect was your decision to suspend disbursement on three World Bank projects in 2006 and then to reinstate the funding ten months later the most effective way to handle the corruption problem?

It was the best way. It was tough on our relationship with the government because it’s a very drastic measure to take. But once we have evidence that our funds are leaking, we really have no other choice but to halt disbursement while we put in place measures to prevent those kinds of leakages in the future. We wanted to send a very strong signal in this country that we are not going to tolerate corruption in our projects and the suspension did that. Many people in Cambodia felt reassured that the Bank was taking this issue very seriously

Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia meet on development triangle

VietNamNet Bridge - Strong pledges were made at a two-day meeting on trade and investment promotion into the “Development Triangle” comprising 10 border provinces of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia concluded in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, on Feb. 17.

Pledges showed the three countries’ resolve to boost investment into the region, strengthen internal link and put into full use potential and available resources of each and every province for economic development, especially production of commodities.

“No stone will be left unturned so as to reach the goal for high and sustainable economic growth ratified by the Prime Ministers of the three countries in Vientiane , Laos , on November 28, 2004,” they said in an agreement.

The Vietnamese head delegate, Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Bich Dat, said the country has issued open policies, offered numerous stimuli and upgraded infrastructure facilities to boost investment from the three countries as well as other countries into the Vietnamese provinces lying in the “Development Triangle.”

“The Vietnamese Government has also taken measures to encourage domestic investors to invest in Lao and Cambodian provinces lying in the Development Triangle,” he added.

The meeting, the second of its kind to date, was marked with a speech by Senior Minister and Trade Minister of Cambodia Cham Prasith. He emphasised the important role played by the “Development Triangle of Cambodia , Laos and Vietnam ” in the socio-economic development of each province in the region and the common future of the three countries as well.

He said the conference would be a good opportunity for businesses and authorities from the three countries’ provinces sharing the borderline to promote trade and investment so as to turn the “Development Triangle” into a region of socio-economically sustainable development.

The meeting drew in over 100 businesses, plus authorities, from the three countries who shared experiences and informed each other with their own countries’ policies and stimuli for foreign investment.

The region has been highly evaluated for its great potential in hydro-power industry, mining, industrial crops growing and processing, and tourism.

(Source: VNA)

Cambodia begins restoring rail system

PHNOM PENH — Cambodia began Monday restoring a 652-kilometer stretch of its decades-old railway system to enhance domestic and international trade, reduce transport costs and ease road traffic.

The $73 million rehabilitation project is expected to be completed in 23 months, according to Sun Chanthol, Cambodia's minister of Public Works and Transportation. Of the outlay, the Asian Development Bank has provided $42 million in concessional loans, $13 million came from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries as a grant, $2.8 million from Malaysia for iron materials and $15.2 million from the Cambodian government, he said.

Visitors to Cambodia reach 2 million

PHNOM PENH — About 2 million overseas tourists visited Cambodia in 2007, an increase of 18.53% from the previous year, the government said Tuesday. South Koreans topped the list at 329,909, followed by Japanese at 161,973, Americans at 137,539 and Vietnamese at 125,442, according to government statistics.

Siem Reap, home of the Angkor Wat temple complex, attracted 1,120,586 foreign tourists in the year, an amazing growth of 30.83 percent from the previous year's 856,510. Tourism Minister Thong Khon told Kyodo News on Tuesday he hopes Cambodia will receive about 2.4 million tourists this year

NASA eyes dark energy, outer solar system missions

By Will Dunham Wed Feb 6, 11:48 AM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. space agency is planning a mission to better understand a mysterious form of energy in the cosmos and an ambitious unmanned journey to the outer solar system, NASA officials said.

NASA would initiate seven new science missions in fiscal year 2009 that starts October 1 under the budget President George W. Bush proposed to Congress this week. NASA's proposed $17.6 billion budget includes $4.4 billion for science missions.

"In fact, we have more new starts in this budget for science than in the last three years combined," Alan Stern, who leads NASA's science missions, said in an interview.

NASA is planning to begin work on a mission to send a spacecraft to either Jupiter or Saturn -- the two biggest planets in the solar system -- with the idea of orbiting one of three moons of these two outer solar system giants. Launch is seen by 2017, with the mission cost pegged at $2.1 billion.

Two of the three moons under consideration orbit Jupiter: Europa, which boasts an ice-covered ocean that some scientists think is a candidate for harboring some form of life; and Ganymede, the largest moon in our solar system.

The third option is Saturn's moon Titan, the second-biggest moon in the solar system. "By the end of this year, we will have it down to our final choice," Stern said.

NASA also is planning a mission involving the launch by 2015 of an Earth-orbiting satellite to study dark energy, a mysterious force thought to cause the universe to expand at an accelerated pace. Scientists think dark energy makes up roughly 70 percent of the universe but do not understand its nature.

Another science mission being planned envisions a spacecraft being launched in 2015 to study the Solar Corona, a region around the sun where the solar wind originates.

"The latter half of the next decade is going to revolutionize our knowledge of how the solar wind is accelerated, the corona is heated, and the inner workings of the star that makes life possible on Earth," Stern said.

"This will be the first mission to ever dive down into the solar corona -- much, much closer than Mercury orbits, and to places where the thermal emissions are just hellacious."

NASA also is planning new robotic missions to the moon and Earth science missions.

(Editing by Philip Barbara)

Cambodian Garment Sector Under Threat

Tuesday February 5, 6:51 am ET

Official: Cambodian Garment Industry Faces Tough Time As U.S. Economy Slows Down PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) -- Cambodia's garment industry expects to see a decline of orders from American retailers amid fear of a slowdown in the U.S. economy, a Cabinet minister said Tuesday, as he warned the country's top export sector by value faces tough times.

"I am concerned that our garment sector would face some problems," Commerce Minister Cham Prasidh said. "Now that the U.S. economy may head into a decline, purchasing orders from U.S. retailers may also decrease."

He said last year's garment exports to the U.S. were worth more than US$1.9 billion (euro1.3 billion). The figure represents about two-thirds of Cambodia's total exports of clothing products in 2007, Cham Prasidh said.

Anti-dumping measures the U.S. has imposed on the import of Chinese goods have so far helped sustain Cambodia's garment export industry.

But at the end of 2008, the U.S. will phase out the measures against China as well as a monitoring mechanism on imports from Vietnam, another competitor, compounding pressure on the Cambodian garment industry, Cham Prasidh said at a press conference Tuesday.

"Competing for that market has not been an easy task," he said.

Ken Loo, secretary-general of the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia, agreed that the industry is facing "a very difficult" time and "stiffer competition" ahead.

Cambodia currently has 300 garment factories that employ 355,000 workers.

Cambodia ranks 12th among the 25 top countries from which the U.S. imports textile products, according the U.S. Census Bureau.

U.S. Census Bureau

Cambodia enjoying real estate boom

Friday, February 1, 2008 at 15:11 EST

PHNOM PENH — After decades of war and upheaval, Cambodia is experiencing a real estate boom fueled by South Korean investment. Sung Bonna, president of Bonna Realty Group, the country's leading real estate agency, said land prices in the capital Phnom Penh rose 50 percent to 80 percent in 2007.

Residential land prices in Phnom Penh rose about $700 to $1,600 per square meter in 2007 from the previous year, while commercial land prices rose $1,200 to $2,500 per sq. meter, Sung Bonna said. He predicted that trend will continue, at least in the short term, due to key factors including political stability and a tourism boom.

Three Thai firms to invest in Cambodia power plant

Reuters - Thursday, January 31

BANGKOK, Jan 30 - Three leading Thai companies said on Wednesday they were studying plans to build a 3,660-megawatt coal-fired power plant in Cambodia to supply electricity to Thailand.

Top builder Italian-Thai Development PCL , Electricity Generating and Ratchaburi Electricity Generating Holding gave no indication of how much the plant would cost.

But they said in a statement to the Thai stock exchange they had signed a memorandum of understanding to study joint investment in the plant in the Cambodian coastal province of Koh Kong near the Thai border.

EGCO and Ratchaburi would hold a combined stake of 70 percent and Italian-Thai Power, 15 percent owned by Italian-Thai Development, would have the other 30 percent, they said.

The three firms were talking to the state-run Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand about supplying electricity generated by the plant to Thailand, it said.

Construction was expected to start in 2012 and the plant to begin operations in early 2016, the statement said.

At 0926 GMT, Italian-Thai shares were up 3.9 percent at 8 baht, Electricity Generating was up 2.69 percent and Ratchaburi was 1.18 percent lower.

中国「世界の工場」に陰り 韓国続々撤退／台湾は南アへ

1月30日8時28分配信 フジサンケイ　ビジネスアイ

　■背景に優遇税制廃止、人件費上昇

　「世界の工場」「１３億人の巨大消費市場」として海外から投資を吸い寄せてきた中国だが、ここ 数年、事業撤退や投資国の変更に踏み切る東アジア企業が増えてきた。今年１月に外資優遇を原則廃止した新たな企業所得税法や、従業員の待遇を向上させる労 働契約法を相次ぎ施行。さらに投資先での現地トラブルが外資企業に「中国離れ」を加速させている。外資を装った中国資本の迂回（うかい）投資増で外国直接 投資（実行ベース）総額が増大する半面、日韓台などは下降線をたどっている。（坂本一之）

　≪工場「夜逃げ」≫

　韓国紙 の朝鮮日報によると、中国山東省青島に進出した韓国企業は約５０００社だが、賃金上昇などの経営環境の変化に対応できず、今年１～６月期中に事業撤退する 企業が１０００社に達し、同地区進出企業の２割が姿を消す可能性もあるという。繊維やアクセサリーなど軽工業の製造業などが苦戦している。

　 ２００５年８月に中国に進出し山東省で皮革工場を展開した韓国企業の場合、中国で広がる賃金上昇で人件費コストが拡大し採算が悪化。撤退に伴う設備の賃貸 料金の交渉で現地トラブルに発展した。韓国系工場の中には事業清算せずに、「夜逃げ」のように中国から消えるケースもある。

　中国商務省の統計によると、韓国企業の対中投資実行額は０４年の６２億５０００万ドルから、昨年は１～１１月段階で３２億３０００万ドルと３年でほぼ半減のペースになった。

　≪「先行指標」悪化≫

　また、米紙ウォールストリート・ジャーナルによると、台湾企業が中国から投資先をベトナムなど東南アジアなどに移す動きがめだち始めた。

　 中国商務省の統計で台湾企業の１９８９年から２００７年１１月までの累積投資額は約４３９億ドルという。租税回避地（タックスヘブン）の英国領バージン諸 島など、台湾にカウントされない第３地経由を含めると、台湾企業の対中投資は５００億ドルを大きく上回る可能性もある。中国のビジネス環境をよく知る台湾 の動きは、日本など外資にとり「対中投資の先行指標」と目されてきた。

　中国進出する台湾企業２０００社への昨年末の市場調査で、中国本土への投資拡大を検討していると答えた企業の割合は前年調査から１０ポイント近くも下がり約５０％という。先行指標である台湾の「中国離れ」は、対中投資環境悪化を予感させる。

　≪沿岸から内陸へ≫

　 韓国や台湾に加え日本など東アジアの主要プレーヤーが中国から徐々に腰を引く背景には外資優遇制度の廃止がある。昨年まで法人税率は１５％などの優遇税率 が適用されてきた外資だが、中国企業と同じ２５％に統一された。労働者権利を強化した労働契約法も今年から施行され、外資にとって中国ビジネスのコストが 急速に上昇している。

　こうした投資環境変化について日本貿易振興機構（ジェトロ）では「中国での生産拠点は沿岸部から徐々に内陸に移行していくことになる」と話し、中国政府が進める内陸部新興の動きに合わせて低賃金労働を求める製造業などが沿岸部から内陸に移る動きもあるとみている。

　 しかし、実際には中国政府による加工貿易の禁止品目の拡大や増値税還付率の削減などの産業政策もあり、もはや内陸部ではなく「チャイナ・プラスワン」、さ らに中国を飛び越える「チャイナパッシング」として、ベトナムやカンボジア、インドなどに注目する外資が増えており、対中投資ブームは完全にピークを過ぎ たといえそうだ。

アンコール遺跡修復 あの「チーム高松塚」再結成

1月31日19時47分配信 産経新聞

　カンボジアの世界遺産・アンコール遺跡群にあり、木の侵食で崩壊の危機にさらされている西トップ寺院（９～１４世紀）を調査している奈良文化財研究所は ３１日、本格的な修復に乗り出す方針を明らかにした。修復に必要なクレーン車は、高松塚古墳（奈良県明日香村）の石室解体装置を開発したメーカーが無償提 供。解体を現場指揮した石工、左野勝司さんも参加予定で、国宝壁画を守ったチームがアンコール遺跡保存で再びスクラムを組むことになった。
　西トップ寺院は、石造寺院「アンコールワット」の北西約３キロに位置。高さ８メートル、幅２４メートルの中央祀堂（しどう）が中心にそびえる。同研究所は平成１０年から発掘調査を行い、構造などを調べてきた。
　中央祀堂は、一辺６０センチほどのブロック状の砂岩を組み合わせて築造されているが、一帯に広がるジャングルの樹木が建物にもおよび、木の根によって崩壊の危機にある。修復作業は３年後をめどに始める予定で、中央祀堂をいったん解体して石材を積み直すという。
　クレーン車や高所作業車など３台は、高松塚古墳の石室解体で石材をつり上げる特殊機器を開発したクレーンメーカー「タダノ」（高松市）が無償提供。２台は３月に現地搬入され、測量調査などに活用される。同社はスタッフを派遣し、現地で操縦士も養成する。
　３１日には香川県さぬき市の同社工場で車両の寄贈式が行われ、多田野宏一社長は「クレーンがあれば作業も安全にできる。人類の文化的遺産を後世に残すた め使ってほしい」、同研究所の田辺征夫所長は「クレーン技術の高さは高松塚の石室解体で証明されており、心強い」と話した。