Cambodia & Analysis: The collapse of trade on the Cambodia-Thailand border in 2025

By August 2025, official trade between Cambodia and Thailand had shrunk to a paltry ten million baht, a collapse of 99.9% according to the Thai Department of Foreign Trade. This figure is far from a simple accounting error; it symbolises the end of a vital trade artery that was once worth billions every month.

The border crossing at Poipet--Aranyaprathet, once buzzing with lorries and traders, now seems a graveyard of metal and dust. This bitter observation captures the very essence of what Arnaud Darc describes in his analysis:

‘The economic flow between two neighbours has literally dried up’, he writes.

From the spark of conflict to a deadly silence

The dramatic chain of events began with deadly artillery exchanges in May 2025 near Oddar Meanchey, resulting in dozens of deaths and the displacement of thousands of civilians. The escalation culminated in Thai air strikes on 24 July, the first in decades.

This military engagement quickly devolved into open warfare, with civilians paying the heaviest price:

‘Thirty-eight deaths and around 300,000 displaced persons were recorded, while the rumble of lorries gave way to armoured vehicles’ points out Mr Darc.

On 24 July, Thailand began to close its border crossings, followed by Cambodia, which cited violation of sovereignty and security threats.

An unprecedented economic war

The trade blockade became an official strategy: Cambodia banned imports of essential products from Thailand, and anti-Thai boycott campaigns were launched in Cambodia's major cities. On the other hand, Thai companies are denouncing punitive customs controls targeting Cambodian goods.

Through this hostile logic, ‘interdependence has given way to the arithmetic of escalation’ notes Arnaud Darc.

The economic losses are colossal. Cambodian warehouses are seeing their cassava crops rot in the heat, while Thai durians destined for Chinese markets are being damaged in warehouses.

The disruptions are affecting supply chains, exporters and retailers. The estimated cost is in excess of billions of dollars, or around 11.8 million dollars per day of frozen activity, an amount that represents almost half of Cambodia's national budget.

This calamity is affecting both Thai business owners, who are immobilising their fleets, and Cambodian farmers, who are faced with the deterioration of their produce:

‘The tangible weight of wasted crops has become a metaphor for lost confidence’, says Mr Darc forcefully.

A border marked by history and mistrust

This commercial disaster does not arise in a historical vacuum. This border, far from being a simple line, is a ‘scar’, a vestige of the Franco-Siamese treaties of 1904 and 1907, which shaped the region from the colonial era onwards.

The ruling by the International Court of Justice in 1962 awarding the temple of Preah Vihear to Cambodia, followed by a new series of conflicts in 2008-2011, bear witness to a past fraught with tensions. A protocol signed in 2000 set up a joint commission to establish a precise demarcation of the territory. Twenty-five years on, progress has been made, but gaps remain.

As Arnaud Darc reminds us, ‘History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme’.

Politics in the service of nationalism

According to Darc, the recent deterioration can be explained as much by internal political factors as by a border dispute. In Thailand, management of the border crossings is largely the responsibility of the regional military forces, which have significant autonomy over security issues.

In Cambodia, leaders justify economic closures and restrictions as a means of defending national sovereignty, knowing that ‘nationalism remains a powerful argument for governments’.

Despite an extraordinary summit of ASEAN foreign ministers in July 2025 dedicated to this crisis, no major political breakthrough has been achieved, leaving a languishing trade in silence.

The man behind the statistics

The deafening figures hide individual destinies marked by the crisis. Darc gives voice to three emblematic figures: Somchai, a Thai lorry driver, keeps in his cab the last official invoice of a convoy, that of a shipment of watermelons, which has become the symbol of a murdered trade; Sophea, a Cambodian cassava producer, bears witness to her hands cracked by hard work and immense losses; Vannak, a seller at the Poipet market, sells at a loss, embodying the downward spiral of a local economy at the end of its tether.

Towards what resolution?

Despite the lack of immediate solutions, Arnaud Darc sets out some pragmatic measures. He advocates the rapid resumption of technical demarcation by the joint commission, the introduction of green corridors for essential products, administered transparently by customs, and the return of small ASEAN observers to monitor incidents without interfering in politics.

‘Trade is much more than goods, it's trust made visible’, insists Arnaud Darc.

But in August 2025, this fundamental currency disappeared, plunging neighbouring economies into an arithmetic as simple as it was devastating: ‘Ten million bahts, and nothing left to trade’.