Cambodia strengthens Vietnamese trade with economic zones

Cambodia has licensed six special economic zones along its border with Vietnam to boost bilateral trade, according to the Council for Development in Cambodia (CDC).

Of the six SEZs, two are already operational and the rest are still under construction. The largest, the 100-hectare Phnom Den SEZ along the border with An Giang Province, which cost about US$100 million to build, would house agricultural processing companies and is slated for completion in 2015, the CDC said. The Phnom Penh Post newswire quoted Kim Sithan, a secretary of state at the Ministry of Commerce, as saying that trade between Cambodia and Vietnam would increase to over $2 billion after this SEZ is completed. Bilateral trade was an estimated $1.6 billion last year and is expected to reach $2 billion in 2010. Another Cambodian official was quoted by the Post as saying that Phnom Den would “attract both tourists and businesses because it shares a border with the An Giang Province of Vietnam, which is a high growth region.” Reported by Vinh Bao