Cambodia Weighs Shared Documents and Business Codes to Cut Investment Paperwork

A company registering in Cambodia may have to provide the same information again when it applies for a licence or prepares to start operating. The Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC) and the European Chamber of Commerce in Cambodia (EuroCham) are examining three ways to reduce that repetition, according to Cambodia Investment Review’s account of their fourth public-private breakfast briefing.

The proposals would allow relevant ministries to accept a shared electronic version of key company documents, use standard requirements so a digital photograph could be collected once, and rely on one publicly available list of business activity codes. The last change is intended to keep an activity recognised at registration from being classified differently at a later approval stage, the report said. None of the three proposals has been implemented.

The CDC is Cambodia’s investment authority. Its work with EuroCham follows the steps a business takes from investment approval through incorporation and licensing to the start of operations, according to Cambodia Investment Review. The two sides also discussed a broader approach under which ministries would share verified information through the government’s CamDX data-exchange platform, rather than ask companies to submit it again.

According to EuroCham’s account of the briefing, repeated requests for documents have declined since a June baseline assessment. It gave no figures for the decline or for any change in processing time or business costs. Participants discussed which recommendations could be put into effect before the end of 2026 and how to test whether digital changes actually reduce paperwork.

The discussion follows a Cambodia Investment Forum in May at which Deputy Prime Minister Sun Chanthol, the CDC’s first vice-chairman, invited investors already operating in the country to raise challenges and recommendations, the Phnom Penh Post reported. Chanthol also addressed the latest briefing, alongside representatives of Cambodian ministries, foreign embassies and business chambers, according to Cambodia Investment Review. For a business moving from registration to its first day of operations, the practical question remains whether the same documents will still be requested at each counter.