柬埔寨大米出口增长126％（在线收听）

　　柬埔寨大米出口增长126％

　　PHNOM PENH, June 6 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia's exports of milled rice have sharply increased in the first five months of this year thanks to rising international market demand and country's rice promotion strategy, an official said Thursday.

　　The country had exported 146,800 tons of milled rice during January-May period this year, up 126 percent from 64,900 tons over the same period last year, showed the report of the single window secretariat for facilitating milled rice exports.

　　Five main countries purchased Cambodian rice are France, Poland, Thailand, Malaysia and China, the report said.

　　Hean Vanhorn, chief of the single window secretariat for facilitating milled rice exports, attributed the increase to rising demand on international markets and Cambodia's efforts in promoting rice exports.

　　"The growth is also due to more investment by private sector in building sophisticated rice processing plants," he said.

　　Based on the export figures in the first five months, he believed that the country would be able to achieve the target of one-million-ton milled rice exports by 2015.

　　Cambodia is an agrarian country. More than 80 percent of the population is farmers.

　　The Ministry of Agriculture announced in January that the country produced 9.31 million tons of paddy rice last year. Of this amount, besides local consumption, the nation had around 3 million tons of milled rice left over for exports this year.

　　The whole year of 2012, the country exported 205,717 tons of milled rice, up only 2 percent year-on-year.