 Good morning. My name is Murray Hebert from the CSIS Chair for Southeast Asian Studies. It's a delight to welcome all of you to our Banyan Tree Leadership Forum discussion with Minister Sun Chanto of Cambodia. I think many of you know his bio from the invitation, probably have heard of him before, but he was as was named Minister of Commerce in Cambodia in September last year. Previously he's had various posts in the government including Vice Chair of the Council for the Development of Cambodia and also the Minister of Public Works and Transport. The minister brings a lot of private sector experience also having worked for General Electric GE for 16 years. He's sort of a Washingtonian in some ways because he graduated from American University. He's also studied at the Wharton School in at Harvard. Minister Chanto, do you want to sit because you're going to be using it or do you want to come up here? Okay. Thank you. Great. Good mornings. First let me express my appreciation to CSIS for inviting me to this morning. Also to thanks all of you for being here this morning. Without you being here, I wouldn't be here. So I appreciate very much for showing up. Let me take this opportunity to present to you Cambodia. I would love Cambodia and I will walk you through as to the reason why the investor should look at Cambodia. It's a place to invest. So for those of you that never been to Cambodia, Cambodia is located in the heart what I call the center of gravity for Southeast Asia. You can see our country located. So right there where we are and within an hour and a half line time, you can reach over 600 million consumers. That is a glance of the population. The rate is around 15 million. The land size, if you compare, if you put 181 or 35 square kilometers, you don't really see what is it. But if you compare to say France, we have about one third of France. Okay. If you talk about the size, the GDP per capita is over 1,000. The inflation rate is still less than 5%. And so for the first time we have the contributing. So right now it's rate B2. Now here the reason why you should consider is a place to do the investment. Once in macroeconomic stability, which I will go in more detail, the government keyboard is a pro-business government. Again, I'm going to talk, here's all the reason. A pro-business government, competitive investment incentives, a one-stop service, access to the world market, investment protection and so on. So let me go in more detail. In terms of macroeconomic stability, our GDP grew at average 8% for the last 10 years. That probably fastest in Southeast Asia. Our exchange rate has been stable, around 4,000 real to 1 US dollar, which I'm going to show the chart. The inflation is that it's low. Our debt to GDP ratio, it's very low. It's very low. It's, you know, the rule of thumb around 40%, but we only saw 32% debt to GDP ratio. And if you compare this, debt to GDP ratio for a country in Europe, for example, Greece, 177%. I think Japan brought 200%. US close to 200%. So we still have room, still have room to borrow for investment into infrastructure, for example, productive investment rather than borrow for consumption. Our reserve over 3.6 billion US dollars took us almost 12 years to increase from a million, about 100 million to a billion, but took us only a few years to increase to that 3 billion US dollars. So we're stable. This GDP growth, about 2009, we don't really, we didn't grow because the whole economic crisis, but we're still doing okay. But now, last year, 7.6, and we expect the GDP to grow 7.5, 7.6 to 94, 5 years. GDP, you can see, nicely per capita. Currency been stable. Inflation is low. Foreign reserve is good. Trade deficit, but it's not that significant. Deficit is also small. You can see around 6%. Now, we compare all the country in the region, Cambodia, it would take out the 2008, 2009, we talked about the last 10 years, 9.8%. It's very fast growing economy. Business government is important. We consider private sector as an engine of our economic growth. The accessibility to Kimoon government is very easy. I will give you my business card with my mobile number in there. You can call me. You can SMS me. You can email me. And I mean it. I mean it. But sometimes when you call from OC, it doesn't show the number. It shows all these 001. Sometimes I cannot answer the phone. I'm in a meeting, can't be meeting. I can't answer the phone. I don't know who to call back because show 001. Please text me. Shantung, please call me back. Then I definitely call you back. Okay. Now, we create 10 working groups that co-chair by the private sector. For example, technical working group on infrastructure. So when I was a minister of public working transport, I co-chair that technical working group. We are a private sector as a co-chair. We are a technical working group on banking, on taxation, agriculture, tourism, export processing. So 10 technical working groups that meet on a monthly basis. So any issues that the private sector may have and want to resolve, they will resolve that technical working group. If the technical working group cannot resolve issues raised by a private sector, we will escalate this to what we call the government private sector forum. And this forum is chaired by our prime minister. We invite around 500 private sector in the room. We invite all the ambassadors, IMF, World Bank, ADB, NGO in that forum. The private sector can ask a question to the prime minister, ready issue, and he can make the decision right then. So the minister got to be ready to answer the question to the prime minister, and he can make the decision. The decision made in that forum is considered the cabinet decision because all common cabinet sit in that forum, sit in that forum. So very productive, efficient forum. Now, IFC of the World Bank helped organize the government private sector forum for 24 countries. They did a survey, which country has the most productive, efficient government private sector forum, and I'm proud to say that Cambodia came first. It's the most productive, efficient private sector forum that can resolve the problem of a private sector. Our investment incentive, I would say that our investment law provides the most generous investment incentives in our corporate income tax 20%. We have tax holiday up to nine years, no discrimination between a foreign investor and a local investor. There's no alien business law in Cambodia, and every economic sector is open to investors. Tell me which country that allow our foreign to own 100% banking license. Tell me which country that allow our foreign to own 100% telecom sector. Insurance, agriculture sector. So we are small open economy, no restriction, no price control, no exchange control is important that you can send money to Cambodia, you can take the profit out. There's no issues, try with other country. It's easier to send money in, take the money out can be difficult, can be difficult, but not in Cambodia. So there's no issue in control, and we open, we open every sector of our economy. There's no requirement for you to take local partner doing 100% operation in a country. Labor force in a country which I'm going to go to later on is very young dynamic labor force. The average age in Cambodia is 23.7, and you might ask me why your country is probably so young. It's so sad for me to remind you that the Khmer Rouge wiped out one generation of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, so very young workforce today, but it's not working anymore. It's not moving. Anyway, so the investment incentives, okay. Can you move to the next slide, please? Okay. Also, another reason they have one stop service, the CDC Council for Cambodia. Just like investment board, and I also today serve as a White Chair in addition to my position as a Minister of Commerce. I'm also the White Chair of the CDC. The Chairman of the CDC is our Prime Minister. So my one stop service, we provide you with information. We look at your application, we do the evaluation, we approve your investment, we help you with work permit, visa, commit registration, do the exemption. It's all there, all done, all done at the CDC. Access to the world market, we are a member of the DWTO, we are a member for ASEAN, and product-making Cambodia, you can be shipped to European country without duty. So that's very, very good for us, very competitive advantage there, because you're a product-making Vietnam. On Thailand, they pay tax when you ship to European country, not from Cambodia, not from Cambodia, and also they have GSP from the U.S., which gives us a low custom duty raise also. We are MFN with all these countries, we have investment protection agreement with all these countries, all those bilateral investment protection agreement, all those behavioral sign and the bilateral investment tree with the U.S., but our investment law, our investment to protect the foreign investor. So we're looking to move forward with bilateral investment treaty with the U.S., I had the opportunity to meet with Master Michael Froman during my visit, so we talk about that, that we need to move forward with a bit in order to attract maybe more FDI from the U.S., because U.S. companies probably want to wait and see until we get the BIT before they invest in the country. But having said that, we have U.S. company always in there, General Electric, head office there, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Google, Chevron, Caltech, and so on and so forth, is there, but it's not enough. We like to attract more FDI from the U.S. Infrastructures, it's getting better, getting better. We build the ASEAN highway that connects Cambodia to Thailand, to Vietnam, Cambodia to Laos. We rehabilitate our railway that connects Phnom Penh to our deep seaport. We, in the process of rehabilitating the railway to connect to the state railway of Thailand, so goods and services, or goods and people can travel from Singapore to Malaysia to Thailand to Cambodia. That's the first phase. Second phase would be to build a spur from Cambodia to Vietnam. Then you can ship goods or people can travel from Singapore, Malaysia to Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Kunming, and Canada to Europe. That's part of what we call Singapore-Kunming railing project. We upgrade our seaport in Singapore, allow bigger ships to dock on our port. We build new container ports in Phnom Penh. We upgrade our airport. So infrastructure is a lot better than before. We lay fiber optics across the country, power plant being built. This, you can see the map of Cambodia and all the roads. So we build a lot of roads that connect to Vietnam. This side is Vietnam. Connect to Thailand and to Laos. You need to do the integration within the country and integration with our neighboring country. This is the port, this is the international port. We also allow private sector to build a port on the BOT basis. This railway, the line that's already been rehabilitated from Phnom Penh to our deep seaport in Oval. We're going to move to rehabilitate this line to connect to Thailand. This missing link for eight kilometers was destroyed through the war, but now we're almost complete that link. And then Thailand will complete their section also of six kilometers. Then we can come all the way to report. Then the future is to go through CMRIP, the hope of Angkor Wat, the 107 wonder of the world, and go along the river here. And this connect to Vietnam and this connect to Laos so that their special economy zone 33 has been approved by 11 in operation. The special economy zone is good that they have water, supplies there, electricity is there, west water implant is there, it's one location. We are custom, we are all controlled, it's been done at that location. So it's easy for investors to put their factory there and everything is there in one stop. The special economy zone mainly located along the Cambodian-Thai border so that people can take advantage of Cambodia's EBA from Europe, GSP, they put a factory near the border so that the workers, the product can be shipped out back from Cambodia easily to Thailand and to Vietnam. I mentioned to you within one and a half hour of flying time, over 600 million consumers that you can serve. Sound financials, we don't have a problem with economic crisis 97, we didn't have a problem, 2008, the financials crisis, again Cambodia didn't have any problem with banks sector. We have a lot of banks, 35 banks, if I can get a license, 35 banks, but I think that sector will go through consolidation. I don't think that Cambodia can have 35 banks, the market price is small, you can see some consolidation later on. Deposit, 7.1 billion, the credit to private sector also about the same size. We have stock exchange, but we had only one company listed on stock exchange to start with. Last Monday, last Monday, second company was listed, so we hope to list more and more company on our stock exchange. Resource, oil and gas, mineral, bauxite, so we had opportunity to meet with Chevron doing my trip also. They have Block A in Cambodia, they do the exploration there and definitely the reserve there. We reserve there so we're going to proceed with the discussion, negotiation with Chevron to conclude that project in order for us to do the extraction of our oil on the coast of Cambodia. Population, you can see again very young, extremely young population, looks at 65% between 15 and 64, 64 years old. Very young dynamic workforce, this investment trend. Approved by country, you can see U.S., very small, but we see China, Korea, EU, Malaysia, Vietnam, and other country. So I hope and we try to expand trade investment, we hope that U.S. company will invest more in Cambodia. Again, this investment by sector. I think we can, at least you can download. I think CSIS can post it and then they can, if I want this presentation, can download. We didn't print the presentation, try to save a few trees from being cut to make the paper. So investment opportunity, maybe agriculture sector, labor intensive industry, but we try to move away from a labor intensive industry to a semi-skill. So we talk about food processing, light manufacturing, transportation, ICT, energy, human resource development, that area that we like to attract FDI from. Again, back to reason to invest in a country. Now, I'm telling you all the good reason Rose's picture about Cambodia. They said it's impossible. It can't be something that, you know, it's not working. Well, let me be honest. Corruption is one issue that exists in Cambodia, but corruption exists in other countries. The question, what are we doing about it? Are we doing something about it? Yes, we're doing something about it. Last two years ago, we passed the anti-corruption law in the country. We set up the anti-corruption unit to fight corruption. The government official had to declare the asset, the asset, and when they take the possession, had to declare the asset again when they leave the possession. So, and then put in envelope to seal it. So the anti-corruption unit, the ACU, can open envelope anytime that, okay, we suspect that official is unusually rich. He can open and say, look, you declare you have one car and I have 10 cars. We're the money to buy 10 cars, additional nine cars. So this is the kind of thing that we are doing. Now, another reason, another thing that we do is we try to automate a lot of manual process to automate that. For example, at my ministry of commerce, today you need to see all certificate origin in order to export the product. You come to my ministry, give all the papers, so we key in all information for you. So there's interface between the government official and the private sector. That you leave room for them to negotiate, leave room for them to ask for facilitate payment. So now I put that online, hopefully by September. This system is going to be online. You don't have to come to the ministry of commerce. You can submit your application, the information online. You can print your own CO at wherever your factory located. We just review the information online. We release it. We just deduct the fees, the $30 or $38 fees from your bank's account, and there you go. You get your CO. Come to the registration. Today, I had to go to my ministry also to ask for the name. So look, I want to use this name, ABC Company. Then my staff would tell you, come back two days from now. We had to check for you. So you go away. You come back two days later. I said, look, I want to use XYZ. The guy said, come back two days from now. That's why XYZ has been used already. Come back again. I want to use Donald Duck. Okay, come back. Wow, Donald Duck has been used already, but with the right price, I think I can tweak it. This is the kind of thing that's happening. Again, I've got to tell you the reality. But I'm doing this online also. So we're going to come to ABC online. So ABC, computer comebacks have been used. XYZ has been used. Donald Duck has been used. So you do this online. So when you cut down the interface between a private sector and a government official, you can cut down corruption. In addition to that, the government raised a salary of 27, 25% every year. I bet your private sector would love to get even 10% every year. We do 25% every year. Again, to give them additional salary and proper salary so they don't resort to corruption. We also allowed to take some of the fees, for example, the certificate of origin CO. We charge $38 to the private sector. The finance ministry and the anti-government unit has agreement with the minister of commerce that you can take right 10%, keep 10% of that amount. And then you dole out as a reward for good work performing to your staff. So now we have all that money put in the pool and we distribute that to our people. But we tell them, swine, you can get that money, additional bonus, but when you come to work, we have to scan. You've got to scan your finger there, what time you're right to come to work, what time you leave. You don't just don't come to work, but at the end of the month, we have my bonus. Before, we don't have the system. So every time we don't see them, they show up at the end of the month to collect the bonus. But not anymore now. I get a finger, you've got to scan that. So that's the thing that we're doing to fight the corruption. Another thing, logistic cost, income water is expensive. All those, we do a lot of infrastructure, but still it's a little more expensive in terms of logistic cost in Cambodia. The electricity is also more expensive than Thailand, than Vietnam, but we're building power plants now. And the next few years when they come online, the price of our electricity will come down. Today, we buy some from Vietnam, we buy some from Thailand, we buy electricity from Laos, but five years from now, we probably export our electricity back to Vietnam because the grid there already. So these are some of the issues that I'd like to be upfront with you. Minimum wage issues. A few months ago, you see a lot of demonstration for the workers, the factory, or the government industry textile that asked to raise the minimum wage from $80 to $160 in one go. They went double overnight. And when the owner and the government did not agree to the demand, they do demonstrations, some violence doing demonstrations and so on. So now they increase from $80 to $100. And we are working with ILO, International Labor Organization, work with the World Bank to sit down and do scientific calculation. What the number should be? Is that $160 or should be $200 or should be $157? For example, before we just plug the number of the air, you know, $80 is good, or $100 is good. But now we've got to do properly, scientifically. Is it $180 or $160? And when we do this, we want to make sure that Cambodia is still competitive. You cannot pry yourself out of the market. If you do that $160 or $200, look, I'm going to go Myanmar. They pay $57 a month. So this is the kind of thing that we need to look at both all angle in your world. We must look the whole forest, not the tree. So that Khmer government has been doing that right now to resolve the labor issue, the minimum wage and so on. So let me stop at this point and leave more time for you to ask question. Is that okay? If you ask question, yeah? I can stand here actually. I can stand here. I have more chat here, but I didn't talk about USA thing, but it's okay. You can get it laid on. Please identify yourself. Hello. Hi. My name is Dr. Dono Wells. I'm an expert in the Russian language internet. Can you talk about popular internet access rates in Cambodia as well as how the Cambodian government intends to approach issues pertaining to internet freedom? Thank you. Thank you very much. The population is 15 million. As of 2013, we have 4 million internet users. And a year before, 2.7. So you see the growth rate of about 50 percent every year, the internet access. So it's important for our young population to have access to the internet. And we're in the process of drafting finalizing e-commerce law, because we're going to move through the e-commerce to digital economy. So hopefully by September, we're going to submit these e-commerce law, e-centure, e-payment. So that will accelerate our population to really learn how to use the internet. We have a meeting with PayPal. We have internet, e-commerce, you've got to have the payment system. So we're going to talk, we always have a meeting with PayPal. We have a meeting with a different bank and so on to get ready for the e-commerce when it's come online. So we are moving, we're pushing in that direction. A lot of people using social media in Cambodia, the Facebook and Twitter and our letter. We, our ministry also have a Facebook, so please follow our Facebook, www.facebook.com.moc.gov.kh. MoC, Mr. Commerce, Gov is Government, KH, Cambodia. We had, you know, we set up about seven months ago, not eight months yet. We have already 78,000 fans, not bad for seven months. So to show you that, yeah, people are interested in the information. So the digital media, our young generation don't watch TV that much, but they go through social media. So it's important that the government push and also know how to play the social media game. I hope to answer your question. Yep, just ma'am. Hi, Kristie Ellis with Women's Wear Daily. Regarding some of the reforms you've made and some of the meetings you've held on minimum wage with apparel brands and retailers, I understand that Levi Strauss and Company recently pulled some business out of Cambodia with concerns about repression of labor rights in the area of protests and unionization. I'm wondering what steps specifically you'll take this year to address those concerns. Are you planning to hold more meetings with retailers and brands? They're very concerned. They've sent letters, I think, maybe to you and the Prime Minister regarding the violence on January 3rd on which five workers were killed when armed security forces opened fire. So if you could address that, I would really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you very much. In terms of the brand, we have the buyers, major brand from the U.S., from all over the world that go to meet with us. Two months, three months, the whole brands, the buyer go to Cambodia to meet with the government to find out the issue with the labor. Not like I mentioned to you that we are in a process of working with ILO to calculate the minimum wage, the minimum wage, and also for ILO to talk to the union, to educate them also. Some of them don't really understand the labor law. You cannot just do a demonstration like that without going through the whole process. So we need to educate the union also. You know, only in Cambodia, I think that we are so free that we allow everybody to create union in your world. Each factory, some factory has 10 different unions. I think four or five people uniform union in Cambodia. So now we need to really, so we're in a process drafting the union law right now to really regulate, not to stop them from organizing the labor union, but at least for them to understand the role of responsibility, the employer, the employee, the union. So we address that issue. Now, labor struggles reduce their order from Cambodia. Target also reduce, I think, the order from Cambodia because they are afraid that the labor unrest and so on. But so far in the incident in January, it's practically calm, safe, no issue. It's under-regretable that the five workers were killed during the violence demonstration. And when I said violence is really violent, they burned factories and it is uncalled for, actually, the whole from both sides, actually, from both sides. So I hope that we will not have this kind of violent demonstration in this sector. Yeah, when people understand that Cambodian government is doing something, before they don't understand it, look, we ask for 160, you guys keep said 180. You don't tell the reason why you cannot do it. But now we go through the whole calculation with them. So with that, I hope they understand and we will not resort to stride a violent stride. But you know, all those are our labor, again, the cost probably more than Myanmar. But Cambodia is the first country that adopt ILO. We have better factory Cambodia. The ILO is there, has an office that could inspect the factory for worker condition, worker right, no child labor, no sweatshop. We're the only country that respect that. So the buy also, look, we really like to pay more, you know, the gap and the like. And we like to pay more for the product made in Cambodia because we know that the labor standard is respected. So that's our competitive advantage by having the ILO and we comply with ILO and comply with BFC Cambodia. I hope you answered your question, ma'am. Yeah, but we continue to have dialogue. I sit with them also. The meeting chair by our Deputy Prime Minister, Prime Minister Ketchon, and I also always sit in the meeting with the buyer to listen to them, take their concern, and then to work among ourselves to try to resolve that. Yes, we always, because they want to tell us, you know, look, we're coming this month. So I think every two months, yeah, two months they go there to have a meeting with us. And I have a meeting every three months between the Government Manufacturing Association and BFC, the better factory Cambodia, the ILO, to also address any issues that BFC might have with our factory, any issue with GMAC, the Government Manufacturing Association, here with the union. So that, every three months. Yes, sir, in the back. Thomas Yandel, American University. You have, Cambodia receives a very large amount of overseas development aid, ODA. And I'm sure you're familiar with the debate to what degree ODA is a backstop to true government reforms, because it allows a government not to reform and still receive a lot of money. And my question is, there's a big debate about, particularly Chinese aid. If I was an investor, how would you show me that in spite of all that unconditioned aid, you're engaging in serious economic reforms? And I'm talking about show me rather than just tell me. And I'll give you an example, I study Vietnam. Vietnam has this Provincial Competitiveness Index, where every year there's an index about improvement in every province. Does Cambodia have such a thing, or work on establishing such a thing? How do you show me that government improves consistently and the government works on it? Thank you, every four of you. You put it this way. Last year, 2013, we had the election. The ruling party lost 22 seats, before they have 90. I won 23 in National Assembly, and we lost 22 seats. So there's a lot of people vote, and we lost 22 seats. It was really a wake-up call for the ruling party. And so we are going all out to reform. Like I said, I'm doing reform at my ministry. Other line ministry also doing reform. Education was reformed there to improve the quality of our education. Finding ministry. Taxation. Taxation also reformed. They put everything online, tried to generate more income. Custom reform cut down on the corruption there. The speed, the process of cleaning, the good from the ports come control my unit that also inspects the food safeties and exports. Again, we stopped doing 100% inspection. We do risk management, 2%. So this kind of reform that we're doing at the level of the line ministry. And the prime minister made it very clear each line ministry must go through the process and eliminate the rate of reform. He who reformed will lead the country in 2018 the election. So we see that it's important. If we don't reform, 2018 our party might not win. So it's important. It's a major wake-up call for us. And it's a good thing for Cambodia that the CPP, the Rune Party lost some seat. It shows that people won't change. People won't reform. And we listen. We listen to the voter. And that's why I'm going all out at my ministry. I revamp completely. Restructure. Reorganize the whole mystery of commerce that never been done for the last 20 years. Never. So I've done that. Reform. Okay. I have an organization assigned people to write people to write places. And you assign people, you promote people that know, not who they know, but what they know. So that's what I'm doing at my ministry. Before you just, the ministry had the power to appoint someone to position. I don't do that. I announce the open position at my ministry. Then the staff can submit their application or resume. And each one of them had to interview with my seven deputies. Each one of them scored them, rang them, put in the envelope, sealed it, don't put their name. Give me the seven envelope. I had the last one to interview the candidates. A minister interviewed every candidate for their position. Then get a score. Then I put on Excel spreadsheet, open each envelope, score that. We sit down together. We review that. And it's like the past. This never been done in Kimbun history. Never, ever that the people get promoted, get nominated, appointed through interview. This is the first time. And that is spreading from my ministry to the ministry of education to appoint the director of the department, go through the interview. Very transparent. Before, if you know someone or you pay for the position, you get appointed. So when you pay, there's investment. When there's investment, you want to return. So return through what? Through corruption. So there's no investment today. You don't pay a dollar to get promoted. And so that's what we're doing, sir. We try. But again, the reform does not take overnight. This is work in progress. Work in progress. Reform that. Reform. Administrative reform. Judiciary reform. A major one. We just pass law. Major reform in that area. So it's work in progress. Like I said, he who reform will reap the benefit next election. Yes, sir. Hi. My name is David Miller. And I'm from University of California, Davis, the College of Agriculture and Environmental Science. I was interested about, hear more about your working groups, particularly the one in, excuse me, the one in agriculture. We've been having a lot of difficulty with them with them with Mard, the Ministry of Agriculture Rural Development. They're trying, trying very hard. And yet they know nothing about business. We're working with smallholder farmers who very much have difficulty perhaps because of past history of Cambodia forming themselves into value chains in which they can do collective marketing, collective buying, all those kinds of elements that you, that you turn agriculture into a commercial sector with smallholder farmers. And I was wondering where, where are there cross silos between ministries where the Ministry of Commerce would work with the Ministry of Agriculture to build agriculture as an industry in Cambodia? Thank you, sir. Agriculture sector is very, very important for, for Cambodia. You know, 80 percent of our people live on the farm. And so we need to help them. Now, we just create, we put our rice, Cambodia's rice federation again to help the farmers to be able to, you know, to sell the rice paddy to this federation rather than sell rice paddy to Vietnam or sell rice paddy to Thailand. So we try to do very added in the country. I work very closely now with the Ministry, Minister of Agriculture on, on, on working group. Okay. But again, I have to be, to be frank and honest with you, that think our working group number nine, that number nine was not working properly before, but never had a new minister now. He's just been appointed at the same time with me in September. And we're going to move to strengthen that working group, that technology working group to really help our sector. And so we're going to do, you know, federation of rice exporters, rice federation, rubber federation. We're going to have silk and so on and so forth. That's how we're going to help our farmers. So please come to give some ideas. We need badly. So during my trip, we got a unit to meet with ADM, hopefully we'll meet with Cargill as they can go there and help and also give them some ideas how to do it. We have one PhD from Cambodia also sees very good in food security, food safety, climate change, impact on our culture in Cambodia. She also helped Ministry of Agriculture and Fishery. Yeah. So I hope I answered your questions. But before it didn't work well, didn't work at all actually, but now it's getting better. Yes, please do, please do, because I'm also the vice chair of that technology working group of that agriculture technology working group. So I think the back question, yes sir. Hi, my name is Storm Tef. I'm with Human Rights Watch. I appreciate your mention of the anti-corruption unit and their ability to investigate members of parliament. It seems like the issue with corruption is more transparency than it is an ability to investigate. Cambodia still has a law which makes it a crime to publicly disclose assets members of parliament and seems like those who would support such a law would be one that would have issues with hiding assets or having something to hide. I'm wondering why would Cambodia would support such a law if they don't have anything to hide? Why Cambodia supports such a draconian law? The law that would make it illegal to publicly disclose assets of members of parliament? Why? No, the member of parliament sent that member of the government director on up must declare the asset. And the ACU anti-corruption unit, they pulled out. They see that person unusually rich. They opened the envelope and they said, look, here are two cars. Now your garage has five cars. Show us the source of your income to do that. Maybe I don't understand the question right, but our law, our anti-corruption law, it probably one of the toughest one in the world, very, very tough. But now the implementation, okay, this is a young organization, very young organization, okay, that they need capacity billing also for them to detect how to how to audit, how to identify, how to cut the people, okay, that one. Another thing, we all signed MOU, ACU anti-corruption unit signed MOU with Coca-Cola, first company in Cambodia that calls that we will play by the rule, by the law. We resist the temptation or we resist the bribery. So Coca-Cola signed MOU, the first company because Coca-Cola had to comply with FCPA in the U.S. But at the same time, they must comply with the anti-corruption law in Cambodia also. So they signed MOU. So we hope that more and more companies will sign this MOU and they play by the rule. Sometimes, again, take two to tango, the tango, right? Because if you don't bribe, if they demand you don't pay, what are you going to do? You slow down a day, your shipment don't clear, we have a hotline. My ministry put a hotline. CO, 40 hours, you don't get 40 hours, you call a hotline. And then we're going to find out why the CO is not issuing 40 hours as the rule in our ministry because we pay for bribery. So we also have a hotline, try to address this corruption issue. Again, we are fighting it, we are fighting it, okay. It's a work in progress. We teach our people, we send our people overseas to learn, and you know, how do they do in Singapore? We went to Hong Kong to learn from people in Hong Kong how you control the corruption. But again, if you don't raise the salary, have, you know, sufficient or proper salary, then the temptation is there. And if you leave a room for them, the temptation is there also. But they put it even online. What are you, how are you going to meet and demand the bribery from people? Thanks for that answer. Thank you. It seems like instead of having members of parliament privately disclose their assets to the anti-corruption unit, it seems like transparency and having them publicly disclose their assets would seem like a more direct way to fight the corruption issue. Well, I get the law that requires, based on the law that everyone has to declare the asset, again, the CL envelope, you know, and they locked up and they can pull out any time to review it. And then not only that, I think so, once every two years, you also declare too. Not, not, you're right to wait until you leave the position. Every two years, go back, you resubmit again, again to compare again. The old one, the new one, in two years, my God, five houses, where you come from. But if you can justify, yeah, I buy a house if you could. Look, in the first one, I have 10 hectares of land, I just sold five hectares of land so that money I could buy cars. It's okay, you can justify that, it's fine. But if you don't, then where do you get money from? Any question, please? Yes. I'm Subitia Sok, a Cambodian student attending George Mason University. I know that Cambodia is opening their economic doors in 2015 for the ASEAN economic community. Just wanted to know, like, how ready are we for competition, especially in the labor force? Okay. That's a good question. 2015, December 31st, 2015, ASEAN community will be created. ASEAN economic community will be created 2015 with the 600 million consumer. EAC is created to create a single market, single production base for ASEAN. Today, for the old member of ASEAN, six old members, the tarot rate 99.2 percent is all zero already. But for the newer member, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam is around 98.7 percent, between zero and five percent. So by 2015, most of that is zero. The zero to five can be reduced. So there's a free movement of goods, services, capital, and skilled labor, skilled labor. So people said, are you concerned with EAC? Cambodia, I mean, what are you concerned? I said, I'm not concerned. EAC, look at our location. Look at our location. Cambodia can be used as a center, or a platform, as a factory, as a warehouse to serve even the two countries, Vietnam, 90 million consumers, Thailand, around 70, just right being the two countries, we will benefit from the EAC because single production base, single market. So Cambodia will move along, where you like or not, 2015 EAC will be in place. Cambodia is ready. Cambodia is ready to be part of EAC. Today, out of the 400, 200 plus activities that ASEAN member state had to complete by December 2015, 80 percent plus of all ASEAN member states are complete activities. So another million, 20 percent will be done from now until 2015. Now, 2015 doesn't mean that the clock will stop. Now, continue to do more negotiation, implementation of the EAC. Now, for Cambodia, people say, oh, with the free movement of skilled labor, the people will come to Cambodia, take the job away from Cambodia. I said, I'm not concerned. I don't expect a doctor in Singapore will migrate to be a doctor in Cambodia, earn $1,000 versus $10,000 or 20,000 in Singapore. I'm not afraid of that at all. What I'm concerned, I'm concerned is that I might have a brain drain of our engineer will go to work in Singapore, get more money. Our doctor, if they qualify, go to work in Thailand, for example. But in order to keep them in a country, we must attract more FDI to create jobs for them, better-paying jobs to keep them in a country. And that's why this part of trade mission that I come with U.S. Ambassador called Reverse Trade Mission, where we bring U.S. businessmen to the U.S. to do business matching with the businessmen in the U.S. to attract more FDI to Cambodia to create a better job to keep them in a country. But it's going to be very good for ASEAN. ASEAN, in the process of negotiating, as a regional comprehensive economic partnership between 10 ASEAN countries, FDA, with Japan, Korea, China, India, New Zealand, Australia, that has 3.4 billion consumers, so represent 48 percent of the world population, combined GDP of 21.2 trillion U.S. dollars. So this is going to be a good time for Asia Pacific in the next century as well. But having said that, TPP is also important, the Trans-Pacific Partnership of the U.S. So ASEAN 10 countries, 10 members state, 4 negotiate ASEAN and also they negotiate with TPP. Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, they are members of negotiations for the TPP. Cambodia is not part or party to the TPP, but it doesn't mean we do not want to be a part of the TPP. So we need to get ready, signed the U.S., signed bilateral investment treaty with the U.S. that want a condition that will lead us to the TPP. So we get ready just in the time that the TPP, but the TPP is not going to happen tomorrow. Again, TPP that. And if it happen with Congress allow President Obama to coincide, I don't know. So probably not two or three years. So three years from now, I think we will be ready to jump on that bandwagon if they allow us. I hope we answer the question. Thank you. Can I ask you, one of the things that you alluded to here is the technically skilled labor. One of the problems you hear from foreign investors is that they have trouble finding people at high skills. Could you tell us a little bit what you're doing, what Cambodia is doing to develop the engineers, the managers, etc. that Cambodia needs? Good question. Today we have a mismatch. What we produce from our university and what the investor want. We produce PhDs, MBA, accountant, manager, but the investor give me technician, give me addition. We don't have. We don't have. Why? Because you had to understand the mentality of Asian family. I don't want my kid to go to technical vocational school. I want my kid to get a PhD, a bachelor, a master degree. So then the mind said but when they graduate, there's no job. So now we shift. We shift to more and more vocational training school in order to provide the skilled labor to the investor. We also encourage the investor to set up the training facility. Many bear Japanese company that move relocate from Thailand to Cambodia. They said, look, I need 5,000 workers, skilled labor. We couldn't give to them. So they set up their training center and they asked, look, I'm going to train the people. But in return, Mr. Government of Cambodia, I want exclusivity for motor that certain type of motor. I want five years exclusivity. Please do not allow any other investor to come in. They take all the workers that I train. So we trade off, okay, five years on a few specific motors that many bear produce. So we do that to give the incentive to train more people. A and Z Bank came to Cambodia, recruit people. I don't want the people that work for the bank. I want to fresh anybody that don't understand anything about banking, please come to work for us. They train them. So that's how we work. But we shift more and more to vocational training facility program. Yes, sir. Yeah, I hear you and we hear that you have a lot of problems. But I want to add one more problem to you, moving on roads. You know, we travel from Phnom Penh to Siam Rift, which is about 200 miles. And it takes about six hours. So my question is, you have any plan to solve this kind of problem? Okay, I'm sorry, I'm trying to, can you give me the map? Oh, oh, yeah, I'm sauce camp, some sauce camp retiree from the State Department. Let me address him as uncle, you know, uncle's a good question that you asked today. Is that the time of the company to see him, which is the the hobo uncle, what takes around six hours? We are expanding the road. We build a road from Phnom Penh on the way to Siam Rift, 80 kilometer, expand to four lanes. And from there to Siam Rift, we enlarge it to 12 meters. And as for concrete, they're going to be probably the best road from Phnom Penh to Siam Rift that will cut down your travel time from six to three and a half hours. Okay, but we'll take two more years to complete that road. So today, construction, so very slow to go to Siam Rift. Now, I'm trying to get the map so I can show people what uncles asked on that, not this one, the road map, yeah, with all these. But anyways, we build a lot of road, road numbers, this road number six, okay, the Phnom Penh. So from up to here to Skun, that could be four lanes. And then we enlarge to 12 meters, okay, as for concrete. Here from here, route number five, 30 kilometers, also we build the four lanes. Then from here to there, Japanese JICA also help us enlarge to four lanes. And later on, that's all going to be four lanes, going to be four lanes. We, in the process of reviewing the application on a BOT, build operating transfer of a company to invest in expressway, four lanes from Phnom Penh to our deep-sea port. Now, we have another company also looking to do the BOT, Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh City, four lanes also. We are building the Mekong Bridge here. Today, you have to wait for the ferry 2015. The Mekong Bridge will be ready. You can go from Cambodia in the morning. You have breakfast here in Phnom Penh. Then you drive to Vietnam, you have lunch in Vietnam. Then you come back here, then in Cambodia, take you four and a half hours from Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh City. So a lot of road being built, a lot, a lot of road being built in Cambodia. And also, right now, try to build a road connecting Kampong Chanang to Kampong Tomeraya, cut across right here, and also from Battenbaum to Siem Reap. So from this tourism, a pole to another tourism pole here in Battenbaum, there's going to be a road crisscross right here. That's on our master plan, because I have the opportunity to serve as a Minister of Public Work and Transport. So we set up a lot of master plans to build a road. So uncle, please come back. We want to go now, take you six hours to go to Siem Reap. But you go back in two years, take you three and a half hours to go to Siem Reap. Very fast, beautiful road. Any last questions? Yes. Thank you, Minister Dental. I just, since you already met— Can you introduce yourself, please? Sofatsang from VOA, my service. Since you mentioned serious economic reforms, I wanted to ask you what is sort of the assurance. I mean, the Cambodia government has mentioned economic reforms before. You as the new Minister of Commerce, what are the assurances this time that the government is taking these reforms very seriously? Well, the insurance to reassure the investor is when you had to reassure yourself the question, do you want to win the election 2018? It is a yes. We want to win the election. If you want to win the election 2018 to be relevant, you stick to your reform agenda and do it quick, do it fast. If not, you will not be there. So that's why we understand that. We know that we must reform. Without reform, we're going to have a problem in 2018. We cannot track FDI if we don't reform. Then people don't have a job. Without a job, create social unrest. So the government and Cambodia understand that. That's why we move to reform, meaningful reform, like what we did, you know, what we're doing at the Minister of Commerce, at education, at custom, taxation, all that, at finding ministry. In general, there's major reform, judiciary reform. If the court system in Cambodia is not independent, who's going to invest money in Cambodia? If the local partner or Cambodian are going to win the case through bribery, no one will go there. So that's why we have a major law just passed to ensure the independence of our court system so that the investor will have a confident in our court system and they invest in the country. Without that, no one will invest. Thank you. Any other question? Well, thank you very much. I hope I answered your question. And please, please come to visit us. We are committed. Cambodia government committed, determined, determined to reform. We cannot build Cambodia alone. But with our determination, with our commitment, with the participation of the private sector, together we can build a better future for Cambodia. Thank you. Thank you very much, Minister Chantel, for that very engaging and lightning presentation and discussion. You brought a lot of energy. You're very enthusiastic. That's great.