The Kingdom imported 584 tonnes of steel from Vietnam in the first five months of 2021, down 1.5 per cent year-on-year, Vietnamese media outlet VN Express reported.
PHNOM PENH (The Phnom Penh Post/ANN): The global health crisis caused by the Covid-19 outbreak has dragged down investment in the Cambodian construction sector, which had shown positive signs for several years in a row.
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Just $7.8 billion in new construction projects were approved in 2020, down 32.1 per cent on a yearly basis. Hean Rangsey
Investment in construction crumbles under pandemic
Wed, 2 June 2021
The global health crisis caused by the Covid-19 outbreak has dragged down investment in the Cambodian construction sector, which had shown positive signs for several years in a row.
Last year, the Ministry of Land Management, Urban Planning and Construction approved just $7.8 billion in new construction projects – down by 32.1 per cent from $11.4 billion in 2019, covering 17 million square metres, down by 26.9 per cent, the National Bank of Cambodia’s said in its latest
Financial Stability Review 2020 (FSR 2020) released on May 31.
Cambodia’s steel and cement imports were worth $469.88 million last year, eroded by 28.66 per cent from $658.71 million in 2019, as the Covid-19 crisis put a halt to many construction projects, slowing activity to a crawl.
Blockades and other movement restrictions imposed to stave off the spread of Covid-19 – further fuelled by the February 20 community outbreak – have brought the construction sector to a near standstill, according to industry insiders.
Ieng Sotheara, co-founder of Arakawa Co Ltd, which owns the Arakawa Residence condominium development, told The Post on April 28 that the project was behind schedule and that the number of workers had been reduced from 2,000 before the lockdown to about 100, all of whom stay onsite.
In addition to labour shortages brought on by the travel ban, he said the project also encounters obstacles in transporting construction materials to supply the site.