China and Cambodia have agreed over the technical aspects and legal framework of a bilateral free trade agreement (FTA), Sok Sopheak, secretary of state at the Cambodian ministry of commerce and head of the country’s negotiating team, recently said without disclosing when the FTA will be signed. Cambodia has listed around 340 more commodities to export to China, bringing the total number of such items to more than 10,000. He said the FTA would be signed soon and is expected to be implemented early next year.
Most of the products are in agriculture and agro-processing and are in addition to what Cambodia has received from the ASEAN-China FTA. “China will be allowed to list more than 9,500 products for export to Cambodia,†Sopheak said. The FTA would create jobs and generate tax revenue for the government.
Sopheak said as Cambodia is one of the least developed countries, so with this status, Cambodia can reduce custom tariff step by step for imported products from China. It takes at least from five to 10 years or even 20 years to turn the custom tariff to zero. Sopheak added that most of the imported products from China are raw materials for the garment sector, construction machinery, steel, and other assembly items.