Cambodia’s cashew industry is setting goals on exploring new markets across the globe as part of the Kingdom’s trade diversification strategies, according to a top official of the Cashew nut Association of Cambodia (CAC).

Uon Silot, the President of CAC, was speaking to Khmer Times as the eight Cambodian food companies including four registered CAC members showcased their products at a key South Korean food expo facilitated by the Ministry of Commerce of Cambodia.

The expo, 18th in the series, organised by Gwangju Tourism Organisation in Gwangju City primarily focused on natural and organic food products, processed and frozen food, coffee and bakery, as well as Franchise and food tech.

Over 300 companies, representing a total of 450 booths from 10 different countries including Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Indonesia, Taiwan, Mongolia and Russia held in Kimdaejung (KDJ) Convention Center, South Korea, showcased their food products.

The CAC association has brought Cambodia food companies to showcase their products such as the ‘Handcrafted Cashew nuts Stung Treng’ and ‘Cashew Village’ from Siem Reap Province to attend the food exhibition aimed at promoting Cambodia’s processed products as well as introduce the potential of Cambodian cashew crop.

Speaking to Khmer Times, Uon Silot said that CAC is an independent institution established by farmers and cashew processing enterprises, which is not affiliated with any institutions. Likewise, the association is a non-political and non-profit institution that has good relations with all government institutions, organisations, national and international companies.

He stressed that farmers have cut down about 100,000 hectares of cashew trees in recent years due to the change in the weather making it hard to grow the crop, replacing it with the field of cassava. However, after the farmers learned about the potential of the new cashew seed called ‘M23’ they have replanted over seven million seeds, covering nearly 40,000 hectares.

Therefore, Cambodia has only about 700,000 hectares of cashew plantations, compared to 2021, the country has a total of 800,000 hectares, Silot added.