Kampong Cham Province

Kampong Cham operates as Cambodia's rubber heartland—the province controls 63% of total national rubber plantation land through seven state companies including Chup, Peam Cheang, Krek, and Memot. The sector generated $640 million in 2024 sales (up 30% from 2023), with production reaching 407,209 tonnes at an average price of $1,617 per tonne. This industry supports 140,000 workers and 420,000 dependents. Boeung Ket plantation has announced expansion into latex glove manufacturing for export, signaling vertical integration.

The provincial economy reached $2.65 billion in 2024 (8.6% growth), with projections of $2.867 billion and $2,478 per capita GDP in 2025. Agricultural productivity depends on the Mekong's annual floods, which deposit nutrient-rich silt across floodplains ideal for rice, rubber, and cashew cultivation. But upstream hydropower dams in China and Laos have reduced peak water levels by up to 11% at the Kampong Cham gauging station, decreasing sediment essential for fertility and fisheries.

The province's relationship with its river illustrates both opportunity and vulnerability. The same fertile red-yellow podzolic soils that support rubber also made the region a target for forest conversion: between 2001 and 2024, approximately 35,700 hectares of tree cover were lost in the most affected districts. Kampong Cham's economy grows on extractive agriculture that depletes the forest and depends on hydrological patterns increasingly disrupted by upstream infrastructure decisions made in Beijing and Vientiane.