Minimum wage talks kick off in Phnom Penh
The Labour Ministry put forth a suggested figure of $148.20 for next year’s minimum wage as tripartite wage talks started on Friday, leading some unions to say that they would consider lowering their demand of $179 in hopes of reaching a compromise. Kicking off the negotiations, 16 representatives each from the government, employers and unions attended the first tripartite meeting in Phnom Penh, where the ministry said it was only offering stakeholders their estimate of increases in the seven criteria used to determine Cambodia’s minimum wage, which currently stands at $140 a month. “This is not the ministry’s figure. We are just looking at the change in each of the criteria, and it is 5.83 per cent,” said ministry spokesman Heng Sour of the $148.20 number, which was far closer to the one recently floated by factory representatives.
