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| Hiroaki Sakashita, Japan’s Vice Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, speak during the bilateral talk meeting with officials from the Cambodian Ministry of Public Works and Transport at Raffles Le Royal hotel. Photo supplied. |
A bilateral talk meeting was organizes at the Raffles Le Royal hotel on Monday between Japanese delegation, led by Mr. Hiroaki Sakashita, Vice Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, and officials from the Ministry of Public Works and Transport (MPWT), led by senior minister Sun Chanthol.
According to the MPWT’s Facebook page, the purpose of the meeting was to discuss about the issues to increase cooperation between the two ministries on the development of the soft infrastructure and issues related to the modernization of vehicle registration and inspection administration systems, port development, improvement of access to the airport and automated gateway transit (AGT), railway transport improvement, sewage treatment system, and the formulation of a logistic Master Plan.
During the meeting, Mr. Sakashita highlighted the importance of soft infrastructure development which could help to increase the safety and effectiveness of the transportation network in the kingdom.
To achieve this goal, Mr. Sakashita proposed the two ministries to expand the cooperation between their related departments in a view to accelerate the development of soft infrastructure in the country’s transportation sector.
The vice minister also asked Cambodian officials to exchange the information between the two ministries concerning future trends and activities related to infrastructure improvement including soft infrastructure.
In response, Senior Minister Sun Chanthol expressed his gratitude toward Japan’s good will to help Cambodian people in the field of infrastructure development as well as capacity building training programs for MPWT’s staffs.
Concerning automated gateway transit (AGT) system, previously, Senior Minister Sun said that Cambodia was seeking a budget of $800 million to develop this transportation system.
“The feasibility study of the AGT project conducted by JICA, that took a year, is already completed. We need to study it further to determine whether we want to give the project to the private sector to develop or seek grant money to develop it in partnership with others,” said Mr. Chanthol in a seminar on technical cooperation in the transport sector.
According to Asian Development Bank (ADB), the primary road network is 2,263 km of paved roads connecting the country to its neighboring countries; the secondary national roads are 3,360 km, most of which are unpaved and 6,441 km of provincial unpaved roads.
The ADB added that the Ministry of Public Works and Transport, in cooperation with other 10 development partners, is managing an investment program with the total amount of $2,706 million over five years (2014-2017) for the construction of roads and bridges in the kingdom. The high priority was given to 15 projects with the total amount of $803 million, of which $500 million will be for the construction of a new railway link to Vietnam.
As for 40,000 km of rural roads, it is the Ministry of Rural Development that manages them. These rural roads are covered with earth or laterite; they are 77 percent of the total road network.
From the ADB’s point of view, the local materials for paving the road are often of poor quality. So, the roads need to be repaired every three years. On the other hand, the lack of border exit facilities slows down trade and passenger traffic. However, cross border facilities exist at Trapang Kreal and Bavet, and the construction of two other border facilities are in progress at Lork and Prey Var at the border with Vietnam.
“There is stakeholder interest in building a railway from Thailand to Viet Nam … To achieve this, a new railway line is required from Phnom Penh to the northeast border ... It is anticipated that private finance will be required because of the high cost involved ($500 million–$600 million),” the ADB said.
Some of the ADB’s criticism about the transportation sector is low private sector participation, lack of connectivity to services and markets, and incomplete and inefficient transport infrastructure networks, especially for railways and provincial and rural roads.
The Japanese government has helped Cambodia to install and renovate its infrastructure with a view to promote the participation of the private sector in the developments and the reforms taking place in Cambodia.
Through the “Agreement between Japan and the Kingdom of Cambodia for the Liberalization, Promotion and Protection of Investment,” the Government of Japan has assisted Cambodia since 2008 to build necessary infrastructure that attracts Japanese investors more and more to come to invest in the Kingdom.
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