The locally-owned Urbanland Asia Investment Co Ltd on October 5 launched the Chankiri Palm Creek gated-community project just south of Phnom Penh with units planned to be made available for sale next year.

Chankiri is Urbanland’s first such residential project and is located along National Road 2 in Kandal province, just off of Hun Sen Boulevard, the company said.

Its managing director Kang Hok said Urbanland was stepping up its game with Chankiri following the success of its other development projects since its founding in 2013.

These include Raintree and Embassy Central in the capital and the Treeline Urban Resort in Siem Reap town, he said.

“For our upcoming projects, we conceptualise our homes with people, create park spaces that enable the community to thrive and bring people to reconnect with nature.

“We spend half of our life at home and have an intimate relationship with our living space. Improving that space will vastly improve people’s lives.

“Here we are prioritising what we now know people care a great deal about – security and safety, interior functions, community and a sense of belonging as well as incorporating the essence of nature through careful consideration of the flow of light and air inside each unit,” Hok said.

CPL Cambodia Properties Ltd chairman and CEO Cheng Kheng told The Post that the market for gated-community projects has been flourishing, but noted that sales of units priced $100,000 or more were currently on a downswing.

He said: “We are witnessing a growing gated-community market notwithstanding the current [Covid-19] situation. Transactions of units in projects that target the middle class remain strong.”

The market for gated communities has blossomed everywhere across the capital’s outskirts and along National Road 2, he said. “There is demand everywhere for units that cost less than $100,000.”

Cambodia imported $565.91 million worth of building materials in the first half of this year, while arrivals were in excess of $1.51 billion for the whole year 2019, data from the Ministry of Economy and Finance’s General Department of Customs and Excise show.

Broken down by category, the Kingdom imported 217,151 tonnes of steel worth $140.8 million, 681,817 tonnes of cement worth $43.27 million and 672,785 tonnes of “construction equipment” worth $381.84 million.

The government approved more than $3.84 billion of new projects in the construction sector during the first half of this year, surging 13.26 per cent year-on-year, the Ministry of Land Management, Urban Planning and Construction reported.