AKP Phnom Penh, August 20, 2014 –
The Royal Government of Cambodia released here this morning the preliminary results on the first ever agriculture census 2013.
The release was presided over by H.E. Chhay Than, Senior Minister and Minister of Planning, with Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Representative Ms. Nina Brandstrup, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Country Director Ms. Rebecca Black and many government officials in attendance.
According to the preliminary results, the total area of the agricultural holdings is 3.1 million hectares, while the total number of parcels is 3.7 million, said H.E. Chhay Than on the occasion.
Cambodia’s agriculture remained a large, undeveloped sector, contributing 31.6 percent of GDP. There were 2.6 million households listed, of which 2.2 million or 4 out of 5 households were engaged in agricultural activities.
Some 1.9 million of the total 2.6 million households have agricultural holdings. The biggest area of the agricultural lands was reported by the holdings in the Tonle Sap Lake region with 1.45 million hectares or 47 percent of the total agricultural land area.
The census was conducted from April to June 2013. It required as many as 4,000 enumerators and supervisors to complete the field work: a survey of all households in all villages from the 25 provinces and from five selected districts in Phnom Penh. It was implemented by the Ministry of Planning’s National Institute of Statistics and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries with technical support from FAO, and financial support from the Royal Government of Cambodia, the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID), the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), and USAID.
By Khan Sophirom