It’s troublesome counting all that money

Quoting Cambodia’s Development Weekly, VNA says that Cambodia has so far this year pulled in $2.5 billion in foreign direct investment.

Foreign investment into Cambodia has so far this year reached 2.5 billion USD, much higher than last year’s figure.

Secretary General of the State Committee for Investment Suon Sothy said the increase was due to the Government’s approval of foreign-invested projects to develop tourism on islands in Sihanoukville and Kampot province, according to Cambodia’s Development Weekly.

Oh, the perils of financial reporting. That $2.5 billion figure is total investments, not total foreign investments. There is a difference.

Still, considering that two months ago Minister of Commerce Cham Prasidh told a UN conference that investment for the first three quarters of 2007 totaled just $1.8 billion, that’s a moderately impressive 3-month run. Prasidh had hinted as much at the time, though, saying that “two mega-projects under negotiation could boost the figures by year-end,” according to the Phnom Penh Post.

So those two mega-deals — worth about $700 million perhaps, but probably less — must have come through. Still, Cambodia remains well behind last year’s investment total of $4.3 billion, no matter what VNA says.