Cambodia Investment Review
The 32nd Give a Day event, co-hosted by Khmer Enterprise and Swisscontact Cambodia under the Enhancing Entrepreneurial Ecosystem and Investments (3Ei) initiative, took place on 10 October 2025 under the theme “Strengthening Community and Celebrating Our Achievements.” As the final edition of the year, the event served as a space for reflection and recognition, bringing together Cambodia’s entrepreneurial ecosystem actors to review key insights from the year’s sessions and set the direction for Give a Day in 2026.
Give a Day 32 built on the outcomes of earlier editions in 2025, continuing to strengthen collaboration and collective learning among Entrepreneur Support Organizations (ESOs), investors, INGO/NGOs, business associations, academia, service providers, and startups/entrepreneurs. The session emphasized how shared learning and trust-based relationships have advanced Cambodia’s entrepreneurial ecosystem, showcasing progress made across events in Phnom Penh, Siem Reap, and Battambang.
Since its inception, Give a Day has become an action-driven platform for building trust, strengthening partnerships, and fostering collaboration among entrepreneurial ecosystem actors. From its modest pilot in 2021, the initiative has grown significantly. By 2025, it had engaged 1,652 participants from more than 400 organizations across 40 Give a Day events.
In 2025, ten Give a Day events were hosted with five in Phnom Penh, three in Siem Reap, and one in Battambang. The events were focused on topics that align with the pressing needs of the entrepreneurial ecosystem. These events also engaged 362 people from 127 institutions and demonstrated high engagement, with 100% of all participants expressing an intention to attend future events. Satisfaction rates reached 75% in Phnom Penh and an overall 97% in the provinces. Participants highly valued the networking opportunities: 93% (Phnom Penh) and 98% (provincial) established new connections, and 99% (Phnom Penh) and 95% (provincial) found the event to be an effective platform for networking.
H.E. Dr. Vanmunin Chhieng, Delegate of the Royal Government in charge as CEO of Khmer Enterprise, opened the event with remarks highlighting the key activities and critical discussion topics that have been done over the year. He placed particular emphasis on the collaborative effort behind the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Roadmap, detailing its current status and inviting broad participation and emphasized the collaborative effort behind the roadmap, noting its recent progress and encouraging partners to engage and contribute.
The Give a Day team presented a recap of key takeaways and calls-to-action from 2025’s sessions, summarizing common challenges and practical solutions discussed throughout the year.
Participants then engaged in an interactive survey to outline the way forward for Give a Day 2026, focusing on future focus areas, preferred event format and frequency. The input emphasized Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) as the primary future topic. Other popular suggestions centered on finance, including innovative finance, revenue-based financing, and investor engagement. Key priorities also included ESO collaboration and fostering cross-sectoral collaboration. Interactive sessions were overwhelmingly favored for the event structure, with Panel Discussion being the top choice, followed by Workshop and Breakout Group Discussion, while preferences for event frequency were between bi-monthly and quarterly.
The event concluded with closing remarks from Dr. Daniel Nugraha, Country Director of Swisscontact Cambodia, who emphasized the core function of Give a Day as a vital platform for collaboration and networking and encouraged new stakeholders to join future discussions and events. He highlighted that valuable connections often form naturally through brief conversations and affirmed his confidence that the initiative will grow beyond Phnom Penh to other provinces.
Give a Day 32 reinforced the platform’s role in enabling knowledge-sharing, cross-sector learning, and ecosystem-level coordination on themes that matter for inclusive and sustainable growth. The event concluded with a call for continued collaboration and collective action to drive forward Cambodia’s entrepreneurial and investment ecosystem in 2026.
Give a Day is co-financed by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), and Khmer Enterprise (KE), and co-implemented by Khmer Enterprise (KE) and Swisscontact through the Enhancing Entrepreneurial Ecosystem and Investments (3Ei) initiative.
