Koh Kong Port

The Koh Kong provincial port is really a system of three ports. Vessels entering Cambodia from Singapore, Malaysia or Thailand call first at Paklong, on the Gulf of Siam about 15 km from the Thai border, for customs clearance and other formalities. Up to 300-tonne capacity boats can be accepted, or 500 tonnes at anchorage. The 300-tonne boats can then proceed across the bay to Koh Kong town for unloading or transhipment to smaller vessels if required.

Koh Kong is a small provincial capital with no road access to the rest of Cambodia. Road 43 can only be used (with difficulty) by motor cycles at present. Thus after clearance most boats proceed to another provincial port al Sre Ambel, at an inlet the Kompong Som Bay near Road 4, some 170 km from Phnom Penh. Sre Ambel can only accept 120-130 tonne boats, however. Traffic that arrives at Koh Kong in larger boats has to be transhipped between vessels at Paklong or Koh Kong town.

Paklong and Koh Kong have quite good but limited facilities and are very congested, particularly Paklong. There is some warehousing in Koh Kong town to support the transhipment activity. Koh Kong is also a quite an important fishing port, from which about 16,000 tonnes were exported to Thailand in 1993.