ABC Radio Australia
Australia's former Treasurer Peter Costello left parliament four months ago and now is hard at work in Cambodia. Mr Costello is acting as a financial adviser to an investment fund that's planning a 600-million dollar project. If successful it will be the biggest single foreign investment in Cambodia to date, roughly equalling the total approved investment in the country last year.
Presenter: Karon Snowdon
Speaker: Peter Costello, former Australian treasurer
SNOWDON: Peter Costello was Australia's longest Treasurer, holding the post for the 11 years of the Howard Government. Mr Costello resigned from Parliament in October having spent two years in opposition after the Liberal party lost the 2007 federal election.
In November he joined the Australian company BKK Partners, which provides financial and corporate advisory services in the Asia Pacific region. His client in Cambodia is Indochina Gateway Capital Limited, which focuses on private equity investments in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. Its hoping to develop an agri-business fund to focus on Cambodia's agriculture.
Peter Costello told Steve Finch of the Phnom Penh Post newspaper he's in the country to meet with government officials.
COSTELLO: The proposal is that the investment would be in rice, sugar, bananas. That other investors would put together a sizeable sum that would bring the best of Australian technology to the agriculture sector and export state of the art agriculture production to markets outside Cambodia. Its a very large scale investment. We're looking at 600 million [US dollars].
SNOWDON: Mr Costello says Australian technology and know-how will benefit Cambodia.
COSTELLO: Australia is one of the world's major agricultural producers. And that technology, if it were brought into a country like Cambodia, would lift productivity enormously.
SNOWDON: And he believes there are potentially good returns for investors.
COSTELLO: Personally I think agriculture is going to be a great industry for investment. We have seen a spike in food prices in 2008. So I think agriculture is going to come back into its own as an investment in the decades that lie ahead and of course that's a great opportunity for Cambodia. Countries that have natural advantage in agriculture should make the most of them. I think it'll be good for Cambodia, I think it'll be good for Australia by the way. I think its a natural fit.
SNOWDON: The Cambodian Government has made agricultural development its main priority for achieving higher growth and poverty reduction. Around 80 per cent of the population lives in rural areas and in poverty, dependent on agriculture, mainly rice.
According to the Phnom Penh Post, the scale of the IndoChina Gateway project is bigger than anything previously seen in Cambodia. If the fund raised its target of USD$600 million, it would be more than the total of all domestic and foreign investment in the country in 2009. Last year saw a big improvement though - investors are looking at Cambodia with fresh ideas.
But Peter Costello says there's still a long way to go to reassure investors who need a better legal system, business regulation, and straightforward anti-corruption measures.
COSTELLO: There's a reason why we should be against corruption. Eventually corruption undermines development. People who think you can develop an economy and turn a blind eye to corruption are wrong. Really the first thing you need for development is certainty and security for investment and corruption undermines and corrodes that.
Presenter: Karon Snowdon
Speaker: Peter Costello, former Australian treasurer
SNOWDON: Peter Costello was Australia's longest Treasurer, holding the post for the 11 years of the Howard Government. Mr Costello resigned from Parliament in October having spent two years in opposition after the Liberal party lost the 2007 federal election.
In November he joined the Australian company BKK Partners, which provides financial and corporate advisory services in the Asia Pacific region. His client in Cambodia is Indochina Gateway Capital Limited, which focuses on private equity investments in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. Its hoping to develop an agri-business fund to focus on Cambodia's agriculture.
Peter Costello told Steve Finch of the Phnom Penh Post newspaper he's in the country to meet with government officials.
COSTELLO: The proposal is that the investment would be in rice, sugar, bananas. That other investors would put together a sizeable sum that would bring the best of Australian technology to the agriculture sector and export state of the art agriculture production to markets outside Cambodia. Its a very large scale investment. We're looking at 600 million [US dollars].
SNOWDON: Mr Costello says Australian technology and know-how will benefit Cambodia.
COSTELLO: Australia is one of the world's major agricultural producers. And that technology, if it were brought into a country like Cambodia, would lift productivity enormously.
SNOWDON: And he believes there are potentially good returns for investors.
COSTELLO: Personally I think agriculture is going to be a great industry for investment. We have seen a spike in food prices in 2008. So I think agriculture is going to come back into its own as an investment in the decades that lie ahead and of course that's a great opportunity for Cambodia. Countries that have natural advantage in agriculture should make the most of them. I think it'll be good for Cambodia, I think it'll be good for Australia by the way. I think its a natural fit.
SNOWDON: The Cambodian Government has made agricultural development its main priority for achieving higher growth and poverty reduction. Around 80 per cent of the population lives in rural areas and in poverty, dependent on agriculture, mainly rice.
According to the Phnom Penh Post, the scale of the IndoChina Gateway project is bigger than anything previously seen in Cambodia. If the fund raised its target of USD$600 million, it would be more than the total of all domestic and foreign investment in the country in 2009. Last year saw a big improvement though - investors are looking at Cambodia with fresh ideas.
But Peter Costello says there's still a long way to go to reassure investors who need a better legal system, business regulation, and straightforward anti-corruption measures.
COSTELLO: There's a reason why we should be against corruption. Eventually corruption undermines development. People who think you can develop an economy and turn a blind eye to corruption are wrong. Really the first thing you need for development is certainty and security for investment and corruption undermines and corrodes that.
10 comments:
Perter is the long serving and best treasurer Australia has ever had. Sad that he left politic after the 2007 federal electrion when Labour Party crashed the Liberal-National coalition party.
Cambodia is still wast of unutilised and fertiled lands, which are suitable for agricultures (medium and large scale) couple with good Australia technology, the projects would be viable and create opportunity for jobs and potential exports.
Good luck Mr. Costello!
Don't forget that Cambodian ministers are thieves. They lie, cheat, steal..
Thank you Mr. Costello for giving some hope to the unemployed across the country in Cambodia. Confidence shown by Australians investors will undoubtedly attract more FDI from developed countries in Europe and America. In contrary it is hard to understand some opposition members. In politics, it's always good policy to give people hopes. Chasing out investors is a very bad policy. What should Cambodians expect? Just saying "no" to anyone willing to invest in Cambodia is a very bad strategy? Do you want to take the country back to where it was in 1975? What the Opposition’s parties should do is presenting a better development policy, more hopes, and real projects for Cambodians. Not just yelling to chase out good investors. Hard to understand the vision behind that kind of politics (of scarring out investors)!
thank you for seeing that there are more to cambodia than some maverick political group whose job is to paint a bad picture of cambodia, no matter what anybody does. god bless cambodia.
Investors prefer not to invest in Cambodia because Cambodian government officials are extremely corrupt. Those persons are like that because Cambodian government ministers are also very corrupt.
There is no way to stop thieves to steal.
Read ah Kwack!!!!!
""COSTELLO: There's a reason why we should be against corruption. Eventually corruption undermines development. People who think you can develop an economy and turn a blind eye to corruption are wrong. Really the first thing you need for development is certainty and security for investment and corruption undermines and corrodes that.""
Can you make out of some thimg, PhD! with no education?
No company want to invest in a country governed by thieves, bandits, crooks..
SOLD AND GONE
FOLD AND DONE
BANK AND SNORE
fish and sauce
It great opportunity for Khmer and internal if investments go through. It open more door for poor farmer to have better life . Just hope our government not erroupt, surely we see prosperity and democracy with long term investment. Thank u
Mr Costello would not hesitate to deal with the Cambodian Government as they're very generous with land concession and great length of land leased. How very convenient to deal with a very corrupted government as they are free from Royal Commission inquiry unlike in Australia. I hope that his company would abide by a moral standard of not getting involve with land grabbing from poor Khmer peasants and exacerbate further with the current social injustice. The Australian value must be adhere to at all time no matter how big the deal might be.
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