A Special Economic Zone was inaugurated on Thursday in Bavet, Svay Rieng province near the Cambodian and Vietnamese border, aimed at attracting more investment in the country.

Prime Minister Hun Sen attended and presided over the ground breaking ceremony with the participation of more than 2,000 people.

The creation of the zone "has brought tremendous benefits for the Cambodian nationals as a whole," the Premier said. It will create new jobs for those reside in this area, help to increase their family's incomes, attract near-by people into this area, and can transform this area into a newly developed region along the border, he added.

The Manhattan (Svay Rieng) Special Economic Zone was developed by the Manhattan International Group of China's Taiwan.

The zone is six km to the Cambodia and Vietnam border, and about 80 km to the international port and 65 km to the airport of Ho Chi Minh city.

Bavet border gateway is designed to be the biggest passage by land to Vietnam and the world. Situated near this gateway, the zone will provide convenience and advantages to the investors of this zone, Manhattan Group's Chairman Clement Yang said at the ceremony.

Beside the advantage of the geography, the zone has preferential policy as no company income tax for five years and no import tax for equipment, parts and construction materials. Moreover, the zone also enjoys special preferential conditions including no transaction VAT, 50 years of right to use the land and single window to do the export and import processes.

Initial plan for the zone is for 240 hectares in three-phases. Each phase is to be of 80 hectares. When Phase-One completed, there will be around 30 investors with total factory space of 400, 000 square meters. Total employment could reach 15,000 workers and total annual export values near 300 million US dollars, according to Yang.

The group has planned in two to three years to invest about 30 million US dollars for the construction of complete infrastructure, including road, power plants, water-treatment plants, vocational training, bank, posts and telecom, etc.

Source: Xinhua