Phnom Penh (VNA) – Cambodia shipped around 7 million tonnes of agriculturalproducts abroad in 2019, with 4.784 million tonnes exported via officialchannels, according to Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries VengSakhon.

In the year, Cambodia sold 620,106 tonnes of milled rice to foreign countries,of which 248,105 tonnes went to China, 202,990 tonnes to the EU, 83,164 tonnesto Southeast Asian countries, and 85,847 tonnes to other markets.

The Cambodia Rice Federation (CRF) said that Cambodia’s milled rice exportaccounts for about 1.2 percent of the world’s market, with large buyersincluding China’s Hong Kong, mainland China, Singapore and Malaysia.

Cambodia also exported about 1.6 million tonnes of cassava starch, 202,318tonnes of cashew nuts, nearly 120,000 tonnes of corn, 57,250 tonnes ofsoybeans, nearly 157,812 tonnes of bananas, nearly 60 tonnes of mangos, andover 3,693 tonnes of pepper.

China, the EU, ASEAN member states, Japan, the US, the Republic of Korea,India, Saudi Arabia and Australia have been important markets for Cambodianproducts.

Cambodia has exported mostly unprocessed agricultural products. In a bid toincrease value for farm produce, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen began callingfor more investment in agriculture processing and technology in the nation.

The government’s policy is to boost rice production and export 1 milliontonnes; however, of the two goals, the country has achieved only one, Hun Sensaid, explaining the country have a paddy surplus of nearly 6 million tonnesper year but its export could not fetch 1 million tonnes./.