Speaking in the run-up to the nation's first youth employment forum,
panelists from the government, the International labor Organization
and the UN said yesterday that refocusing education would play a major
role in meeting the needs of the 3 million young people expected to
enter the workforce during the next decade.
''In the future, I believe that Cambodia will face challengers in
recruiting labor forces working in the agriculture sector," said Seng
Sakda, Director General at the Ministry of labor.
With a job market that will be increasingly focused within the
agro-industry and manufacturing sectors, education should concentrate
more on technical know-how.
"So many people are graduating with language skills and accounting, so
few with engineering and science degrees," said Jose Bendito, a policy
adviser at UNDP. ''A big majority of the labor market will need
technical and vocational training-anything that deals with machinery;
we will need to build bridges, roads, factories," he said.
==
Cambodia: Banks Ordered to Give Borrower Info
Banks have 90 days to submit their existing customer data to the
Cambodian Credit Bureau (CBC), the country's first credit reporting
system, or they could be fined, the CBC and bank officials said
yesterday.
The establishment of the CBC, which was officially registered this
week, now makes it mandatory for all banks and microfinance
institutions to upload borrower information to the CBC system each
month.
Centralizing borrower data at the bureau will make the extension of
loans to consumers and businesses a more transparent process, the CBC
said.
The CBC is an affiliate of the Association of Banks in Cambodia, the
Cambodian Microfinance Association and New Zealand information
technology company Veda Advantage, which in May won the bid to provide
a creditchecking system for the CBC.
Veda holds a 49% stake in the CBC.
==
Cambodia: SMEs must network to Increase efficiency
High competition among Cambodia's small and medium sized enterprises
was hurting their ability to compete with neighboring countries,
Ministry of Industry, Mining and Energy officials said yesterday.
The ministry has pledged to find cohesion among smaller companies to
improve their efficiency.
The Kingdom's 30,000 SMEs worked largely as independent entities, a
practice that had raised the cost of imported materials and had led to
instability in the supply chain, director general of industry Meng
Saktheara said.
These unnecessary expenses which could be avoided if companies worked
together detracted from SME market research potential and the
competitiveness of Cambodian products abroad, he said.
"Vietnam's goods beat our goods on the market. They have the power to
beat us because they use networks and associations," Meng Saktheara
said, adding that the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce often came to
Cambodia to negotiate on behalf of many companies.
==
