Rising from the plains of Cambodia is a renaissance. A 2015 World Bank report, “Cambodian Agriculture in Transition: Opportunities and Risks,” described the country’s agriculture sector as being one of the fastest growing in the world, with an astonishing annual rate of growth of more than 5 percent from 2004 to 2012.
Over the past five years, Cambodia has experienced the largest percentage of growth in GDP among Southeast Asian countries. Matt Einarson, regional director for Alltech in Southeast Asia, sees this as an opportunity.
“Cambodia’s agriculture sector is teeming with potential,” said Einarson. “What’s needed now are the right nutritional technologies and on-farm services to help livestock producers improve profitability and efficiency.”
Over the past 12 months, Alltech’s business in Cambodia has catapulted, with 33 percent growth over last year.
To better deliver the level of support required to sustain this rate of growth, Alltech is opening its first office in Cambodia. Located in Phnom Penh, the Cambodia team will be led by Channarith Ky, who has more than 20 years of experience in agriculture as a business director and nutritionist.
Alltech already works with producers in Cambodia, supporting them with Alltech’s proprietary acidifiers and organic trace minerals, but establishing a base in the region will position the Alltech team to become a stronger local partner. Domestic feed production has doubled in tonnage since 2013, and it is expected that it will double again within the next three to four years as Cambodia’s agriculture sector becomes increasingly self-sufficient.
Livestock numbers have also grown significantly, with many companies investing in state-of-the-art production facilities. Swine and poultry are the strongest species sectors, with more than 27 million poultry and nearly 2.5 million pigs raised in the country.
