Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy

Minister for Trade Inkyo Cheong met with Cambodia's Commerce Minister Cham Nimul on May 13 in Seoul and held the first Korea-Cambodia Free Trade Agreement (FTA) Joint Committee meeting to assess the bilateral FTA’s implementation progress.

 

Key agenda items included Korea-Cambodia trade and investment performance and implementation outcomes following FTA's entry into force. The two sides welcomed the positive effect of their bilateral FTA, such as the Korea-Cambodia trade hitting record highs last year despite the slow global economy, increase in trade across two countries’ major FTA items, and bilateral people-to-people exchange also recovering pre-COVID levels.

 

The three implementation committees under the bilateral Joint FTA Committee, namely those for trade in goods, country-of-origin and customs procedures, and economic cooperation, suggested updating the Harmonized System (HS) codes, expanding Cambodia’s scope of approved exporter system, and other measures for enhancing Korean and Cambodian companies’ FTA utilization. They also gave a briefing on FTA-based economic cooperation projects and decided to review their implementation progress on a regular basis in the future.

 

Trade Minister Cheong stated that he looks forward to seeing the two countries’ companies effectively leverage the bilateral FTA for trade and market expansion opportunities. He also asked the Cambodian government’s interest and support towards Korean firms for diversifying the supply chain in areas like automobiles, electronics, and food, based on the Korea-ASEAN FTA, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), and the Korea-Cambodia FTA.