Good morning. My name is Murray Hebert from the CSIS Chair for Southeast Asian Studies. It's a delight to welcome all of you to our Banyan Tree Leadership Forum discussion with Minister Sun Chanto of Cambodia. I think many of you know his bio from the invitation, probably have heard of him before, but he was as was named Minister of Commerce in Cambodia in September last year. Previously he's had various posts in the government including Vice Chair of the Council for the Development of Cambodia and also the Minister of Public Works and Transport. The minister brings a lot of private sector experience also having worked for General Electric GE for 16 years. He's sort of a Washingtonian in some ways because he graduated from American University. He's also studied at the Wharton School in at Harvard. Minister Chanto, do you want to sit because you're going to be using it or do you want to come up here? Okay. Thank you. Great. Good mornings. First let me express my appreciation to CSIS for inviting me to this morning. Also to thanks all of you for being here this morning. Without you being here, I wouldn't be here. So I appreciate very much for showing up. Let me take this opportunity to present to you Cambodia. I would love Cambodia and I will walk you through as to the reason why the investor should look at Cambodia. It's a place to invest. So for those of you that never been to Cambodia, Cambodia is located in the heart what I call the center of gravity for Southeast Asia. You can see our country located. So right there where we are and within an hour and a half line time, you can reach over 600 million consumers. That is a glance of the population. The rate is around 15 million. The land size, if you compare, if you put 181 or 35 square kilometers, you don't really see what is it. But if you compare to say France, we have about one third of France. Okay. If you talk about the size, the GDP per capita is over 1,000. The inflation rate is still less than 5%. And so for the first time we have the contributing. So right now it's rate B2. Now here the reason why you should consider is a place to do the investment. Once in macroeconomic stability, which I will go in more detail, the government keyboard is a pro-business government. Again, I'm going to talk, here's all the reason. A pro-business government, competitive investment incentives, a one-stop service, access to the world market, investment protection and so on. So let me go in more detail. In terms of macroeconomic stability, our GDP grew at average 8% for the last 10 years. That probably fastest in Southeast Asia. Our exchange rate has been stable, around 4,000 real to 1 US dollar, which I'm going to show the chart. The inflation is that it's low. Our debt to GDP ratio, it's very low. It's very low. It's, you know, the rule of thumb around 40%, but we only saw 32% debt to GDP ratio. And if you compare this, debt to GDP ratio for a country in Europe, for example, Greece, 177%. I think Japan brought 200%. US close to 200%. So we still have room, still have room to borrow for investment into infrastructure, for example, productive investment rather than borrow for consumption. Our reserve over 3.6 billion US dollars took us almost 12 years to increase from a million, about 100 million to a billion, but took us only a few years to increase to that 3 billion US dollars. So we're stable. This GDP growth, about 2009, we don't really, we didn't grow because the whole economic crisis, but we're still doing okay. But now, last year, 7.6, and we expect the GDP to grow 7.5, 7.6 to 94, 5 years. GDP, you can see, nicely per capita. Currency been stable. Inflation is low. Foreign reserve is good. Trade deficit, but it's not that significant. Deficit is also small. You can see around 6%. Now, we compare all the country in the region, Cambodia, it would take out the 2008, 2009, we talked about the last 10 years, 9.8%. It's very fast growing economy. Business government is important. We consider private sector as an engine of our economic growth. The accessibility to Kimoon government is very easy. I will give you my business card with my mobile number in there. You can call me. You can SMS me. You can email me. And I mean it. I mean it. But sometimes when you call from OC, it doesn't show the number. It shows all these 001. Sometimes I cannot answer the phone. I'm in a meeting, can't be meeting. I can't answer the phone. I don't know who to call back because show 001. Please text me. Shantung, please call me back. Then I definitely call you back. Okay. Now, we create 10 working groups that co-chair by the private sector. For example, technical working group on infrastructure. So when I was a minister of public working transport, I co-chair that technical working group. We are a private sector as a co-chair. We are a technical working group on banking, on taxation, agriculture, tourism, export processing. So 10 technical working groups that meet on a monthly basis. So any issues that the private sector may have and want to resolve, they will resolve that technical working group. If the technical working group cannot resolve issues raised by a private sector, we will escalate this to what we call the government private sector forum.  We invite around 500 private sector in the room. We invite all the ambassadors, IMF, World Bank, ADB, NGO in that forum. The private sector can ask a question to the prime minister, ready issue, and he can make the decision right then. So the minister got to be ready to answer the question to the prime minister, and he can make the decision. The decision made in that forum is considered the cabinet decision because all common cabinet sit in that forum, sit in that forum. So very productive, efficient forum. Now, IFC of the World Bank helped organize the government private sector forum for 24 countries. They did a survey, which country has the most productive, efficient government private sector forum, and I'm proud to say that Cambodia came first. It's the most productive, efficient private sector forum that can resolve the problem of a private sector. Our investment incentive, I would say that our investment law provides the most generous investment incentives in our corporate income tax 20%. We have tax holiday up to nine years, no discrimination between a foreign investor and a local investor. There's no alien business law in Cambodia, and every economic sector is open to investors. Tell me which country that allow our foreign to own 100% banking license. Tell me which country that allow our foreign to own 100% telecom sector. Insurance, agriculture sector. So we are small open economy, no restriction, no price control, no exchange control is important that you can send money to Cambodia, you can take the profit out. There's no issues, try with other country. It's easier to send money in, take the money out can be difficult, can be difficult, but not in Cambodia. So there's no issue in control, and we open, we open every sector of our economy. There's no requirement for you to take local partner doing 100% operation in a country. Labor force in a country which I'm going to go to later on is very young dynamic labor force. The average age in Cambodia is 23.7, and you might ask me why your country is probably so young. It's so sad for me to remind you that the Khmer Rouge wiped out one generation of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, so very young workforce today, but it's not working anymore. It's not moving. Anyway, so the investment incentives, okay. Can you move to the next slide, please? Okay. Also, another reason they have one stop service, the CDC Council for Cambodia. Just like investment board, and I also today serve as a White Chair in addition to my position as a Minister of Commerce. I'm also the White Chair of the CDC. The Chairman of the CDC is our Prime Minister. So my one stop service, we provide you with information. We look at your application, we do the evaluation, we approve your investment, we help you with work permit, visa, commit registration, do the exemption. It's all there, all done, all done at the CDC. Access to the world market, we are a member of the DWTO, we are a member for ASEAN, and product-making Cambodia, you can be shipped to European country without duty. So that's very, very good for us, very competitive advantage there, because you're a product-making Vietnam. On Thailand, they pay tax when you ship to European country, not from Cambodia, not from Cambodia, and also they have GSP from the U.S., which gives us a low custom duty raise also. We are MFN with all these countries, we have investment protection agreement with all these countries, all those bilateral investment protection agreement, all those behavioral sign and the bilateral investment tree with the U.S., but our investment law, our investment to protect the foreign investor. So we're looking to move forward with bilateral investment treaty with the U.S., I had the opportunity to meet with Master Michael Froman during my visit, so we talk about that, that we need to move forward with a bit in order to attract maybe more FDI from the U.S., because U.S. companies probably want to wait and see until we get the BIT before they invest in the country. But having said that, we have U.S. company always in there, General Electric, head office there, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Google, Chevron, Caltech, and so on and so forth, is there, but it's not enough. We like to attract more FDI from the U.S. Infrastructures, it's getting better, getting better. We build the ASEAN highway that connects Cambodia to Thailand, to Vietnam, Cambodia to Laos. We rehabilitate our railway that connects Phnom Penh to our deep seaport. We, in the process of rehabilitating the railway to connect to the state railway of Thailand, so goods and services, or goods and people can travel from Singapore to Malaysia to Thailand to Cambodia. That's the first phase. Second phase would be to build a spur from Cambodia to Vietnam. Then you can ship goods or people can travel from Singapore, Malaysia to Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Kunming, and Canada to Europe. That's part of what we call Singapore-Kunming railing project. We upgrade our seaport in Singapore, allow bigger ships to dock on our port. We build new container ports in Phnom Penh. We upgrade our airport. So infrastructure is a lot better than before. We lay fiber optics across the country, power plant being built. This, you can see the map of Cambodia and all the roads. So we build a lot of roads that connect to Vietnam. This side is Vietnam. Connect to Thailand and to Laos. You need to do the integration within the country and integration with our neighboring country. This is the port, this is the international port. We also allow private sector to build a port on the BOT basis. This railway, the line that's already been rehabilitated from Phnom Penh to our deep seaport in Oval. We're going to move to rehabilitate this line to connect to Thailand. This missing link for eight kilometers was destroyed through the war, but now we're almost complete that link. And then Thailand will complete their section also of six kilometers. Then we can come all the way to report. Then the future is to go through CMRIP, the hope of Angkor Wat, the 107 wonder of the world, and go along the river here. And this connect to Vietnam and this connect to Laos so that their special economy zone 33 has been approved by 11 in operation. The special economy zone is good that they have water, supplies there, electricity is there, west water implant is there, it's one location. We are custom, we are all controlled, it's been done at that location. So it's easy for investors to put their factory there and everything is there in one stop. The special economy zone mainly located along the Cambodian-Thai border so that people can take advantage of Cambodia's EBA from Europe, GSP, they put a factory near the border so that the workers, the product can be shipped out back from Cambodia easily to Thailand and to Vietnam. I mentioned to you within one and a half hour of flying time, over 600 million consumers that you can serve. Sound financials, we don't have a problem with economic crisis 97, we didn't have a problem, 2008, the financials crisis, again Cambodia didn't have any problem with banks sector. We have a lot of banks, 35 banks, if I can get a license, 35 banks, but I think that sector will go through consolidation. I don't think that Cambodia can have 35 banks, the market price is small, you can see some consolidation later on. Deposit, 7.1 billion, the credit to private sector also about the same size. We have stock exchange, but we had only one company listed on stock exchange to start with. Last Monday, last Monday, second company was listed, so we hope to list more and more company on our stock exchange. Resource, oil and gas, mineral, bauxite, so we had opportunity to meet with Chevron doing my trip also. They have Block A in Cambodia, they do the exploration there and definitely the reserve there. We reserve there so we're going to proceed with the discussion, negotiation with Chevron to conclude that project in order for us to do the extraction of our oil on the coast of Cambodia. Population, you can see again very young, extremely young population, looks at 65% between 15 and 64, 64 years old. Very young dynamic workforce, this investment trend. Approved by country, you can see U.S., very small, but we see China, Korea, EU, Malaysia, Vietnam, and other country. So I hope and we try to expand trade investment, we hope that U.S. company will invest more in Cambodia. Again, this investment by sector. I think we can, at least you can download. I think CSIS can post it and then they can, if I want this presentation, can download. We didn't print the presentation, try to save a few trees from being cut to make the paper. So investment opportunity, maybe agriculture sector, labor intensive industry, but we try to move away from a labor intensive industry to a semi-skill. So we talk about food processing, light manufacturing, transportation, ICT, energy, human resource development, that area that we like to attract FDI from. Again, back to reason to invest in a country. Now, I'm telling you all the good reason Rose's picture about Cambodia. They said it's impossible. It can't be something that, you know, it's not working. Well, let me be honest. Corruption is one issue that exists in Cambodia, but corruption exists in other countries. The question, what are we doing about it? Are we doing something about it? Yes, we're doing something about it. Last two years ago, we passed the anti-corruption law in the country. We set up the anti-corruption unit to fight corruption. The government official had to declare the asset, the asset, and when they take the possession, had to declare the asset again when they leave the possession. So, and then put in envelope to seal it. So the anti-corruption unit, the ACU, can open envelope anytime that, okay, we suspect that official is unusually rich. He can open and say, look, you declare you have one car and I have 10 cars. We're the money to buy 10 cars, additional nine cars. So this is the kind of thing that we are doing. Now, another reason, another thing that we do is we try to automate a lot of manual process to automate that. For example, at my ministry of commerce, today you need to see all certificate origin in order to export the product. You come to my ministry, give all the papers, so we key in all information for you. So there's interface between the government official and the private sector. That you leave room for them to negotiate, leave room for them to ask for facilitate payment. So now I put that online, hopefully by September. This system is going to be online. You don't have to come to the ministry of commerce. You can submit your application, the information online. You can print your own CO at wherever your factory located. We just review the information online. We release it. We just deduct the fees, the $30 or $38 fees from your bank's account, and there you go. You get your CO. Come to the registration. Today, I had to go to my ministry also to ask for the name. So look, I want to use this name, ABC Company. Then my staff would tell you, come back two days from now. We had to check for you.  You come back two days later. I said, look, I want to use XYZ. The guy said, come back two days from now. That's why XYZ has been used already. Come back again. I want to use Donald Duck. Okay, come back. Wow, Donald Duck has been used already, but with the right price, I think I can tweak it. This is the kind of thing that's happening. Again, I've got to tell you the reality. But I'm doing this online also. So we're going to come to ABC online. So ABC, computer comebacks have been used. XYZ has been used. Donald Duck has been used. So you do this online. So when you cut down the interface between a private sector and a government official, you can cut down corruption. In addition to that, the government raised a salary of 27, 25% every year. I bet your private sector would love to get even 10% every year. We do 25% every year. Again, to give them additional salary and proper salary so they don't resort to corruption. We also allowed to take some of the fees, for example, the certificate of origin CO. We charge $38 to the private sector. The finance ministry and the anti-government unit has agreement with the minister of commerce that you can take right 10%, keep 10% of that amount. And then you dole out as a reward for good work performing to your staff. So now we have all that money put in the pool and we distribute that to our people. But we tell them, swine, you can get that money, additional bonus, but when you come to work, we have to scan. You've got to scan your finger there, what time you're right to come to work, what time you leave. You don't just don't come to work, but at the end of the month, we have my bonus. Before, we don't have the system. So every time we don't see them, they show up at the end of the month to collect the bonus. But not anymore now. I get a finger, you've got to scan that. So that's the thing that we're doing to fight the corruption. Another thing, logistic cost, income water is expensive. All those, we do a lot of infrastructure, but still it's a little more expensive in terms of logistic cost in Cambodia. The electricity is also more expensive than Thailand, than Vietnam, but we're building power plants now. And the next few years when they come online, the price of our electricity will come down. Today, we buy some from Vietnam, we buy some from Thailand, we buy electricity from Laos, but five years from now, we probably export our electricity back to Vietnam because the grid there already. So these are some of the issues that I'd like to be upfront with you. Minimum wage issues. A few months ago, you see a lot of demonstration for the workers, the factory, or the government industry textile that asked to raise the minimum wage from $80 to $160 in one go. They went double overnight. And when the owner and the government did not agree to the demand, they do demonstrations, some violence doing demonstrations and so on. So now they increase from $80 to $100. And we are working with ILO, International Labor Organization, work with the World Bank to sit down and do scientific calculation. What the number should be? Is that $160 or should be $200 or should be $157? For example, before we just plug the number of the air, you know, $80 is good, or $100 is good. But now we've got to do properly, scientifically. Is it $180 or $160? And when we do this, we want to make sure that Cambodia is still competitive. You cannot pry yourself out of the market. If you do that $160 or $200, look, I'm going to go Myanmar. They pay $57 a month. So this is the kind of thing that we need to look at both all angle in your world. We must look the whole forest, not the tree. So that Khmer government has been doing that right now to resolve the labor issue, the minimum wage and so on. So let me stop at this point and leave more time for you to ask question. Is that okay? If you ask question, yeah? I can stand here actually. I can stand here. I have more chat here, but I didn't talk about USA thing, but it's okay. You can get it laid on. Please identify yourself. Hello. Hi. My name is Dr. Dono Wells. I'm an expert in the Russian language internet. Can you talk about popular internet access rates in Cambodia as well as how the Cambodian government intends to approach issues pertaining to internet freedom? Thank you. Thank you very much. The population is 15 million. As of 2013, we have 4 million internet users. And a year before, 2.7. So you see the growth rate of about 50 percent every year, the internet access. So it's important for our young population to have access to the internet. And we're in the process of drafting finalizing e-commerce law, because we're going to move through the e-commerce to digital economy. So hopefully by September, we're going to submit these e-commerce law, e-centure, e-payment. So that will accelerate our population to really learn how to use the internet. We have a meeting with PayPal. We have internet, e-commerce, you've got to have the payment system. So we're going to talk, we always have a meeting with PayPal. We have a meeting with a different bank and so on to get ready for the e-commerce when it's come online. So we are moving, we're pushing in that direction. A lot of people using social media in Cambodia, the Facebook and Twitter and our letter. We, our ministry also have a Facebook, so please follow our Facebook, www.facebook.com.moc.gov.kh. MoC, Mr. Commerce, Gov is Government, KH, Cambodia. We had, you know, we set up about seven months ago, not eight months yet. We have already 78,000 fans, not bad for seven months. So to show you that, yeah, people are interested in the information. So the digital media, our young generation don't watch TV that much, but they go through social media. So it's important that the government push and also know how to play the social media game. I hope to answer your question. Yep, just ma'am. Hi, Kristie Ellis with Women's Wear Daily. Regarding some of the reforms you've made and some of the meetings you've held on minimum wage with apparel brands and retailers, I understand that Levi Strauss and Company recently pulled some business out of Cambodia with concerns about repression of labor rights in the area of protests and unionization. I'm wondering what steps specifically you'll take this year to address those concerns. Are you planning to hold more meetings with retailers and brands? They're very concerned. They've sent letters, I think, maybe to you and the Prime Minister regarding the violence on January 3rd on which five workers were killed when armed security forces opened fire. So if you could address that, I would really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you very much. In terms of the brand, we have the buyers, major brand from the U.S., from all over the world that go to meet with us. Two months, three months, the whole brands, the buyer go to Cambodia to meet with the government to find out the issue with the labor. Not like I mentioned to you that we are in a process of working with ILO to calculate the minimum wage, the minimum wage, and also for ILO to talk to the union, to educate them also. Some of them don't really understand the labor law. You cannot just do a demonstration like that without going through the whole process. So we need to educate the union also. You know, only in Cambodia, I think that we are so free that we allow everybody to create union in your world. Each factory, some factory has 10 different unions. I think four or five people uniform union in Cambodia. So now we need to really, so we're in a process drafting the union law right now to really regulate, not to stop them from organizing the labor union, but at least for them to understand the role of responsibility, the employer, the employee, the union. So we address that issue. Now, labor struggles reduce their order from Cambodia. Target also reduce, I think, the order from Cambodia because they are afraid that the labor unrest and so on. But so far in the incident in January, it's practically calm, safe, no issue. It's under-regretable that the five workers were killed during the violence demonstration. And when I said violence is really violent, they burned factories and it is uncalled for, actually, the whole from both sides, actually, from both sides. So I hope that we will not have this kind of violent demonstration in this sector. Yeah, when people understand that Cambodian government is doing something, before they don't understand it, look, we ask for 160, you guys keep said 180. You don't tell the reason why you cannot do it. But now we go through the whole calculation with them. So with that, I hope they understand and we will not resort to stride a violent stride. But you know, all those are our labor, again, the cost probably more than Myanmar. But Cambodia is the first country that adopt ILO. We have better factory Cambodia. The ILO is there, has an office that could inspect the factory for worker condition, worker right, no child labor, no sweatshop. We're the only country that respect that. So the buy also, look, we really like to pay more, you know, the gap and the like. And we like to pay more for the product made in Cambodia because we know that the labor standard is respected. So that's our competitive advantage by having the ILO and we comply with ILO and comply with BFC Cambodia. I hope you answered your question, ma'am. Yeah, but we continue to have dialogue. I sit with them also. The meeting chair by our Deputy Prime Minister, Prime Minister Ketchon, and I also always sit in the meeting with the buyer to listen to them, take their concern, and then to work among ourselves to try to resolve that. Yes, we always, because they want to tell us, you know, look, we're coming this month. So I think every two months, yeah, two months they go there to have a meeting with us. And I have a meeting every three months between the Government Manufacturing Association and BFC, the better factory Cambodia, the ILO, to also address any issues that BFC might have with our factory, any issue with GMAC, the Government Manufacturing Association, here with the union. So that, every three months. Yes, sir, in the back. Thomas Yandel, American University. You have, Cambodia receives a very large amount of overseas development aid, ODA. And I'm sure you're familiar with the debate to what degree ODA is a backstop to true government reforms, because it allows a government not to reform and still receive a lot of money.  If I was an investor, how would you show me that in spite of all that unconditioned aid, you're engaging in serious economic reforms? And I'm talking about show me rather than just tell me. And I'll give you an example, I study Vietnam. Vietnam has this Provincial Competitiveness Index, where every year there's an index about improvement in every province. Does Cambodia have such a thing, or work on establishing such a thing? How do you show me that government improves consistently and the government works on it? Thank you, every four of you. You put it this way. Last year, 2013, we had the election. The ruling party lost 22 seats, before they have 90. I won 23 in National Assembly, and we lost 22 seats. So there's a lot of people vote, and we lost 22 seats. It was really a wake-up call for the ruling party. And so we are going all out to reform. Like I said, I'm doing reform at my ministry. Other line ministry also doing reform. Education was reformed there to improve the quality of our education. Finding ministry. Taxation. Taxation also reformed. They put everything online, tried to generate more income. Custom reform cut down on the corruption there. The speed, the process of cleaning, the good from the ports come control my unit that also inspects the food safeties and exports. Again, we stopped doing 100% inspection. We do risk management, 2%. So this kind of reform that we're doing at the level of the line ministry. And the prime minister made it very clear each line ministry must go through the process and eliminate the rate of reform. He who reformed will lead the country in 2018 the election. So we see that it's important. If we don't reform, 2018 our party might not win. So it's important. It's a major wake-up call for us. And it's a good thing for Cambodia that the CPP, the Rune Party lost some seat. It shows that people won't change. People won't reform. And we listen. We listen to the voter. And that's why I'm going all out at my ministry. I revamp completely. Restructure. Reorganize the whole mystery of commerce that never been done for the last 20 years. Never. So I've done that. Reform. Okay. I have an organization assigned people to write people to write places.  So that's what I'm doing at my ministry. Before you just, the ministry had the power to appoint someone to position. I don't do that. I announce the open position at my ministry. Then the staff can submit their application or resume. And each one of them had to interview with my seven deputies. Each one of them scored them, rang them, put in the envelope, sealed it, don't put their name. Give me the seven envelope. I had the last one to interview the candidates. A minister interviewed every candidate for their position. Then get a score. Then I put on Excel spreadsheet, open each envelope, score that. We sit down together. We review that. And it's like the past. This never been done in Kimbun history. Never, ever that the people get promoted, get nominated, appointed through interview. This is the first time. And that is spreading from my ministry to the ministry of education to appoint the director of the department, go through the interview. Very transparent. Before, if you know someone or you pay for the position, you get appointed. So when you pay, there's investment. When there's investment, you want to return. So return through what? Through corruption. So there's no investment today. You don't pay a dollar to get promoted. And so that's what we're doing, sir. We try. But again, the reform does not take overnight. This is work in progress. Work in progress. Reform that. Reform. Administrative reform. Judiciary reform. A major one. We just pass law. Major reform in that area. So it's work in progress. Like I said, he who reform will reap the benefit next election. Yes, sir. Hi. My name is David Miller. And I'm from University of California, Davis, the College of Agriculture and Environmental Science. I was interested about, hear more about your working groups, particularly the one in, excuse me, the one in agriculture. We've been having a lot of difficulty with them with them with Mard, the Ministry of Agriculture Rural Development. They're trying, trying very hard. And yet they know nothing about business. We're working with smallholder farmers who very much have difficulty perhaps because of past history of Cambodia forming themselves into value chains in which they can do collective marketing, collective buying, all those kinds of elements that you, that you turn agriculture into a commercial sector with smallholder farmers. And I was wondering where, where are there cross silos between ministries where the Ministry of Commerce would work with the Ministry of Agriculture to build agriculture as an industry in Cambodia? Thank you, sir. Agriculture sector is very, very important for, for Cambodia. You know, 80 percent of our people live on the farm. And so we need to help them. Now, we just create, we put our rice, Cambodia's rice federation again to help the farmers to be able to, you know, to sell the rice paddy to this federation rather than sell rice paddy to Vietnam or sell rice paddy to Thailand. So we try to do very added in the country. I work very closely now with the Ministry, Minister of Agriculture on, on, on working group. Okay. But again, I have to be, to be frank and honest with you, that think our working group number nine, that number nine was not working properly before, but never had a new minister now. He's just been appointed at the same time with me in September. And we're going to move to strengthen that working group, that technology working group to really help our sector. And so we're going to do, you know, federation of rice exporters, rice federation, rubber federation. We're going to have silk and so on and so forth. That's how we're going to help our farmers. So please come to give some ideas. We need badly. So during my trip, we got a unit to meet with ADM, hopefully we'll meet with Cargill as they can go there and help and also give them some ideas how to do it. We have one PhD from Cambodia also sees very good in food security, food safety, climate change, impact on our culture in Cambodia. She also helped Ministry of Agriculture and Fishery. Yeah. So I hope I answered your questions. But before it didn't work well, didn't work at all actually, but now it's getting better. Yes, please do, please do, because I'm also the vice chair of that technology working group of that agriculture technology working group. So I think the back question, yes sir. Hi, my name is Storm Tef. I'm with Human Rights Watch. I appreciate your mention of the anti-corruption unit and their ability to investigate members of parliament. It seems like the issue with corruption is more transparency than it is an ability to investigate. Cambodia still has a law which makes it a crime to publicly disclose assets members of parliament and seems like those who would support such a law would be one that would have issues with hiding assets or having something to hide. I'm wondering why would Cambodia would support such a law if they don't have anything to hide? Why Cambodia supports such a draconian law? The law that would make it illegal to publicly disclose assets of members of parliament? Why? No, the member of parliament sent that member of the government director on up must declare the asset. And the ACU anti-corruption unit, they pulled out. They see that person unusually rich. They opened the envelope and they said, look, here are two cars. Now your garage has five cars. Show us the source of your income to do that. Maybe I don't understand the question right, but our law, our anti-corruption law, it probably one of the toughest one in the world, very, very tough. But now the implementation, okay, this is a young organization, very young organization, okay, that they need capacity billing also for them to detect how to how to audit, how to identify, how to cut the people, okay, that one. Another thing, we all signed MOU, ACU anti-corruption unit signed MOU with Coca-Cola, first company in Cambodia that calls that we will play by the rule, by the law. We resist the temptation or we resist the bribery. So Coca-Cola signed MOU, the first company because Coca-Cola had to comply with FCPA in the U.S. But at the same time, they must comply with the anti-corruption law in Cambodia also. So they signed MOU. So we hope that more and more companies will sign this MOU and they play by the rule. Sometimes, again, take two to tango, the tango, right? Because if you don't bribe, if they demand you don't pay, what are you going to do?  My ministry put a hotline. CO, 40 hours, you don't get 40 hours, you call a hotline. And then we're going to find out why the CO is not issuing 40 hours as the rule in our ministry because we pay for bribery. So we also have a hotline, try to address this corruption issue. Again, we are fighting it, we are fighting it, okay. It's a work in progress. We teach our people, we send our people overseas to learn, and you know, how do they do in Singapore? We went to Hong Kong to learn from people in Hong Kong how you control the corruption. But again, if you don't raise the salary, have, you know, sufficient or proper salary, then the temptation is there. And if you leave a room for them, the temptation is there also. But they put it even online. What are you, how are you going to meet and demand the bribery from people? Thanks for that answer. Thank you.  Well, I get the law that requires, based on the law that everyone has to declare the asset, again, the CL envelope, you know, and they locked up and they can pull out any time to review it. And then not only that, I think so, once every two years, you also declare too. Not, not, you're right to wait until you leave the position. Every two years, go back, you resubmit again, again to compare again. The old one, the new one, in two years, my God, five houses, where you come from. But if you can justify, yeah, I buy a house if you could. Look, in the first one, I have 10 hectares of land, I just sold five hectares of land so that money I could buy cars. It's okay, you can justify that, it's fine. But if you don't, then where do you get money from? Any question, please? Yes. I'm Subitia Sok, a Cambodian student attending George Mason University. I know that Cambodia is opening their economic doors in 2015 for the ASEAN economic community. Just wanted to know, like, how ready are we for competition, especially in the labor force? Okay. That's a good question. 2015, December 31st, 2015, ASEAN community will be created. ASEAN economic community will be created 2015 with the 600 million consumer. EAC is created to create a single market, single production base for ASEAN. Today, for the old member of ASEAN, six old members, the tarot rate 99.2 percent is all zero already. But for the newer member, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam is around 98.7 percent, between zero and five percent. So by 2015, most of that is zero. The zero to five can be reduced. So there's a free movement of goods, services, capital, and skilled labor, skilled labor. So people said, are you concerned with EAC? Cambodia, I mean, what are you concerned? I said, I'm not concerned. EAC, look at our location. Look at our location. Cambodia can be used as a center, or a platform, as a factory, as a warehouse to serve even the two countries, Vietnam, 90 million consumers, Thailand, around 70, just right being the two countries, we will benefit from the EAC because single production base, single market. So Cambodia will move along, where you like or not, 2015 EAC will be in place. Cambodia is ready. Cambodia is ready to be part of EAC. Today, out of the 400, 200 plus activities that ASEAN member state had to complete by December 2015, 80 percent plus of all ASEAN member states are complete activities. So another million, 20 percent will be done from now until 2015. Now, 2015 doesn't mean that the clock will stop. Now, continue to do more negotiation, implementation of the EAC. Now, for Cambodia, people say, oh, with the free movement of skilled labor, the people will come to Cambodia, take the job away from Cambodia. I said, I'm not concerned. I don't expect a doctor in Singapore will migrate to be a doctor in Cambodia, earn $1,000 versus $10,000 or 20,000 in Singapore. I'm not afraid of that at all. What I'm concerned, I'm concerned is that I might have a brain drain of our engineer will go to work in Singapore, get more money. Our doctor, if they qualify, go to work in Thailand, for example. But in order to keep them in a country, we must attract more FDI to create jobs for them, better-paying jobs to keep them in a country. And that's why this part of trade mission that I come with U.S. Ambassador called Reverse Trade Mission, where we bring U.S. businessmen to the U.S. to do business matching with the businessmen in the U.S. to attract more FDI to Cambodia to create a better job to keep them in a country. But it's going to be very good for ASEAN. ASEAN, in the process of negotiating, as a regional comprehensive economic partnership between 10 ASEAN countries, FDA, with Japan, Korea, China, India, New Zealand, Australia, that has 3.4 billion consumers, so represent 48 percent of the world population, combined GDP of 21.2 trillion U.S. dollars. So this is going to be a good time for Asia Pacific in the next century as well. But having said that, TPP is also important, the Trans-Pacific Partnership of the U.S. So ASEAN 10 countries, 10 members state, 4 negotiate ASEAN and also they negotiate with TPP. Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, they are members of negotiations for the TPP. Cambodia is not part or party to the TPP, but it doesn't mean we do not want to be a part of the TPP. So we need to get ready, signed the U.S., signed bilateral investment treaty with the U.S. that want a condition that will lead us to the TPP. So we get ready just in the time that the TPP, but the TPP is not going to happen tomorrow. Again, TPP that. And if it happen with Congress allow President Obama to coincide, I don't know. So probably not two or three years. So three years from now, I think we will be ready to jump on that bandwagon if they allow us. I hope we answer the question. Thank you. Can I ask you, one of the things that you alluded to here is the technically skilled labor. One of the problems you hear from foreign investors is that they have trouble finding people at high skills. Could you tell us a little bit what you're doing, what Cambodia is doing to develop the engineers, the managers, etc. that Cambodia needs? Good question. Today we have a mismatch. What we produce from our university and what the investor want. We produce PhDs, MBA, accountant, manager, but the investor give me technician, give me addition. We don't have. We don't have. Why? Because you had to understand the mentality of Asian family. I don't want my kid to go to technical vocational school.  So then the mind said but when they graduate, there's no job. So now we shift. We shift to more and more vocational training school in order to provide the skilled labor to the investor. We also encourage the investor to set up the training facility. Many bear Japanese company that move relocate from Thailand to Cambodia. They said, look, I need 5,000 workers, skilled labor. We couldn't give to them. So they set up their training center and they asked, look, I'm going to train the people. But in return, Mr. Government of Cambodia, I want exclusivity for motor that certain type of motor. I want five years exclusivity. Please do not allow any other investor to come in. They take all the workers that I train. So we trade off, okay, five years on a few specific motors that many bear produce. So we do that to give the incentive to train more people. A and Z Bank came to Cambodia, recruit people. I don't want the people that work for the bank. I want to fresh anybody that don't understand anything about banking, please come to work for us. They train them. So that's how we work. But we shift more and more to vocational training facility program. Yes, sir. Yeah, I hear you and we hear that you have a lot of problems. But I want to add one more problem to you, moving on roads. You know, we travel from Phnom Penh to Siam Rift, which is about 200 miles. And it takes about six hours. So my question is, you have any plan to solve this kind of problem? Okay, I'm sorry, I'm trying to, can you give me the map? Oh, oh, yeah, I'm sauce camp, some sauce camp retiree from the State Department. Let me address him as uncle, you know, uncle's a good question that you asked today. Is that the time of the company to see him, which is the the hobo uncle, what takes around six hours? We are expanding the road. We build a road from Phnom Penh on the way to Siam Rift, 80 kilometer, expand to four lanes. And from there to Siam Rift, we enlarge it to 12 meters. And as for concrete, they're going to be probably the best road from Phnom Penh to Siam Rift that will cut down your travel time from six to three and a half hours. Okay, but we'll take two more years to complete that road. So today, construction, so very slow to go to Siam Rift. Now, I'm trying to get the map so I can show people what uncles asked on that, not this one, the road map, yeah, with all these. But anyways, we build a lot of road, road numbers, this road number six, okay, the Phnom Penh. So from up to here to Skun, that could be four lanes. And then we enlarge to 12 meters, okay, as for concrete. Here from here, route number five, 30 kilometers, also we build the four lanes. Then from here to there, Japanese JICA also help us enlarge to four lanes. And later on, that's all going to be four lanes, going to be four lanes. We, in the process of reviewing the application on a BOT, build operating transfer of a company to invest in expressway, four lanes from Phnom Penh to our deep-sea port. Now, we have another company also looking to do the BOT, Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh City, four lanes also. We are building the Mekong Bridge here. Today, you have to wait for the ferry 2015. The Mekong Bridge will be ready. You can go from Cambodia in the morning. You have breakfast here in Phnom Penh. Then you drive to Vietnam, you have lunch in Vietnam. Then you come back here, then in Cambodia, take you four and a half hours from Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh City. So a lot of road being built, a lot, a lot of road being built in Cambodia. And also, right now, try to build a road connecting Kampong Chanang to Kampong Tomeraya, cut across right here, and also from Battenbaum to Siem Reap. So from this tourism, a pole to another tourism pole here in Battenbaum, there's going to be a road crisscross right here. That's on our master plan, because I have the opportunity to serve as a Minister of Public Work and Transport. So we set up a lot of master plans to build a road. So uncle, please come back. We want to go now, take you six hours to go to Siem Reap.  Very fast, beautiful road. Any last questions? Yes. Thank you, Minister Dental. I just, since you already met— Can you introduce yourself, please? Sofatsang from VOA, my service. Since you mentioned serious economic reforms, I wanted to ask you what is sort of the assurance. I mean, the Cambodia government has mentioned economic reforms before. You as the new Minister of Commerce, what are the assurances this time that the government is taking these reforms very seriously? Well, the insurance to reassure the investor is when you had to reassure yourself the question, do you want to win the election 2018? It is a yes. We want to win the election. If you want to win the election 2018 to be relevant, you stick to your reform agenda and do it quick, do it fast. If not, you will not be there. So that's why we understand that. We know that we must reform. Without reform, we're going to have a problem in 2018. We cannot track FDI if we don't reform. Then people don't have a job. Without a job, create social unrest. So the government and Cambodia understand that. That's why we move to reform, meaningful reform, like what we did, you know, what we're doing at the Minister of Commerce, at education, at custom, taxation, all that, at finding ministry. In general, there's major reform, judiciary reform. If the court system in Cambodia is not independent, who's going to invest money in Cambodia? If the local partner or Cambodian are going to win the case through bribery, no one will go there. So that's why we have a major law just passed to ensure the independence of our court system so that the investor will have a confident in our court system and they invest in the country. Without that, no one will invest. Thank you. Any other question? Well, thank you very much. I hope I answered your question. And please, please come to visit us. We are committed. Cambodia government committed, determined, determined to reform. We cannot build Cambodia alone. But with our determination, with our commitment, with the participation of the private sector, together we can build a better future for Cambodia. Thank you. Thank you very much, Minister Chantel, for that very engaging and lightning presentation and discussion. You brought a lot of energy. You're very enthusiastic. That's great.


Let's begin reading here in Ecclesiastes chapter 2 beginning at verse 1 reading to verse 3 And I'll give you a brief review and then we'll move on into our study Ecclesiastes chapter 2 Beginning at verse 1 reading to verse 3 Solomon says I said in my heart Come now. I will test you with mirth therefore enjoy pleasure But surely this also was vanity I said of laughter madness and and of mirth What does it accomplish? I searched in my heart how to gratify my flesh with wine while guiding my heart with wisdom And and how to lay hold on folly till I might see what was good for the sons of men to do under heaven all The days of their lives So as we're going through the book the book Ecclesiastes I mentioned to you But I'll review this with you that the word Ecclesiastes is the Greek Translation of a Hebrew word and the Hebrew word that is being translated is the word preacher So the book of Ecclesiastes is literally the book of the preacher and the preacher is one of the Titles of King Solomon in this particular book Solomon is actually giving his testimony Well preaching a message Now often messages have a great impact when a testimony is given and you can see that and I took a few moments To develop this as I was thinking about this as an introduction and you can see that in scripture You can see that there there's actually a call to give testimony in the Bible for example Psalm 66 verse 16 It says come and hear all you who fear God and I will tell you what he's done for my soul He's saying I want to give a testimony. I want to share and I'm asking you to come and for you to listen There's a king in the Bible. He's found in the book of Daniel His name was Nebuchadnezzar and he gave a testimony in chapter 4 verse 2 and he said this The king said I want you all to know about the miraculous signs and wonders the most high God has performed for me Now Jesus himself gave testimony in John 8 38. He said this he said I'm telling you what I've seen in my father's presence And you're doing what you've heard from your father He was speaking to enemies and he said you're doing things according to your own father, which he is saying is Satan He gave a testimony in Luke 10 verse 18 when he said I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven When you look in the New Testament there are writers who speak in such a way as to give testimony John chapter 1 verse 1 He said it like this that which was from the beginning which we've heard which we've seen with our eyes Which we have looked at our hands have touched this we proclaim concerning the word of life He's saying I have had a personal experience. These are the things. I'm testifying about Apostle Peter and first Peter 1 16 said it like this. He said we did not follow cunningly devised fables When we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we're eyewitnesses of his majesty When you look into the book of Acts and various other books of the Bible The apostle Paul gives his testimony a variety of times in the book of Acts will be seen this in chapter 22 and chapter 24 and chapter 26 The apostle Paul gives the testimony when he was writing to the Philippians in chapter 3 verses 5 through 8 He gave his testimony as he did in 1st Corinthians 15 verses 7 through 10 In Galatians 1 13 reading the scripture. He said it like this. This is his testimony He said you've heard of my former conduct in Judaism how I persecuted the church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it He's giving testimony. This is who I was. This is what I did in 1st Timothy 1 13 He said it like this I was formerly a blasphemer a persecutor and an insolent man But I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief And so you see testimony after testimony after testimony and of all who ever lived Solomon Had the greatest outside of Christ had the greatest of life's experiences More than any man. He's able to say life without God is vanity Throughout the book he shares that a life's not centered on God is futile That's because he wants us to know the meaning of life. That's why he why he wrote he wants us to know What our purpose is and he makes it clear everything that we see is temporary and we ought to see things that way The world and all that is in it is winding down and it shouldn't rule our lives Unthanksgiving We have a bit of a family tradition we go to the auto show on Thanksgiving and look at cars. We can't buy But my family's been doing that forever my my father when I was a little boy took me to the auto show and when my kids were small I took them there and I we do that and and you'll see these cars and and you'll look at a car This there was a for example, there was a Lexus I forget what it was but its model is but I do know it costs a hundred and eight thousand dollars You know, that's almost twice as much as the first house. I ever bought and You can see all these things and these toys and everything and and and some of you You know scraped you worked hard you you wanted there's nothing wrong with by the way working and and achieving a goal Nothing wrong as a matter of fact is a good thing But you discover after you've had it for a little while that the smell of that leather eventually wears off you get tired of going to the gas station having to fill that thing up and You begin to realize that this model was nice But I'm looking forward to the new one and that's kind of what happens, right? As you get something you like something you buy something you get tired of something And you buy something else some people do that with cars some people do that with people They marry somebody get rid of somebody marry somebody else get rid of somebody marry somebody else They do that over and over and over again Why because they're looking for something that can't be filled by a human being or a material object? And that's basically what we're looking at here It's like what Paul said again in 1st Corinthians 7 verse 31 the form of this world is passing away Everything in this world is winding down and therefore should not rule our lives So we know that man's purpose is greater than accumulating material possessions and in our quest to possessions We accumulate the things that end up possessing us our society once understood it Our poets would make it very clear in many ways poets were almost prophetic in some ways They would speak of common experience. They put words to to that experience that people would memorize and But they had something to want it to say and and you see that in In a lot of songs. I mean I'll jump into ancient history for a moment For some of you too young to know these songs and all of that But the old ones you'll kind of remember them or pretend that you do There was a song and it's interesting. This may be something that's somewhat current for some who are younger There was a song that was brought out by this interesting vocal duo by the name of Simon and Garfunkel. What a name, huh? Who likes the name Simon? But anyway? It was called the sounds of silence and I had a young young man in our fellowship. I actually had a I was going to use this song and not done by Simon and Garfunkel, but a more recent one I don't forget the name of the person who brought it out I'll try to remember it even as I'm sharing, but I wanted disturbed. Are you disturbed? Don't be disturbed John Disturbed and some of you heard it. It was it was a redo But I had asked them take some pictures I'm gonna use it as a Song with pictures that kind of create an image and at a certain point They didn't know how to show pictures of this one line and it was the line that I wanted I wanted to use where it says the people bowed and prayed to the neon God they made the people bowed and prayed to the neon God they made and No discredited of my my my guys. I love them very deeply and they did their best But they didn't know what that meant because they didn't understand the generation that put together that song It was speaking about plastic materialism Things that guided people's lives achievements that had no actual fulfillment and the people bowed and prayed to that materialism had become such a great thing in our society that was Looked at as being bad that is now cherished and valued even by pastors who preach that you should always have the things that you desire See so it's Twisted, but the Bible doesn't teach that There was a song Again, I'll jump into ancient history that was called mr. Businessmen many of you've never even heard of that But there's a line in it. I've never forgotten since I first heard it and and it's a question. He says this The singer says did you see your children growing up today? Did you hear the music of their laughter as they said about to play?  Then he goes on to say do you qualify to be alive? Or is the limit of your senses? So as only to survive mr. Businessman you've got it all and you've got nothing you planted a garden in the backyard You don't even take the time to smell the roses that you planted People bowed and prayed to the neon God they made This ultimately diminishes us it clouds the purpose that we were created for Jesus and Luke 12 15 said it like this. He said take heed to beware of covetousness For once life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses our purpose is Much higher Than the material than the sensual it's much higher than having the attention of people Our purpose is to know and glorify God and to enjoy him forever Jesus in John 17 3 said it like this. He said this is eternal life That they know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent this is eternal life to have Relationship with God not to be bound to this earth by the things we possess So Solomon has made it very clear that Life's pursuits without God our vanity physical labor But what may achieve certain things is still unsatisfying and Because our lives are brief experience reveals that there's nothing new under the sun without God Injustice and longing Is all you're ever going to experience and that's what he's been saying and that's what he said in chapter Chapter one, but now he continues his thought into chapter what we call chapter 2 And so he said in verse 1 I said in my heart Come now. I will test you with mirth Therefore enjoy pleasure surely this also was vanity greatness and wisdom Knowledge madness folly None of that satisfies The more he knew the greater the grief and the greater sorrow he experienced So he's thinking if these things don't satisfy well, perhaps pleasure will I'll try to find satisfaction and pleasure and sensual experience In other words, I'm gonna try to live life as if it's just one long Party, so he's saying that he's whatever I wanted. I make sure I got After all I had so much money. I could afford it. So why not have it? You see obviously on the one hand enjoying Life is something we were created to do that Jews rightly understood that God made man to enjoy the blessings of this life It's part of the fruit of knowing and worshiping him in Jeremiah 17 verses 7 and 8 Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord whose hope is in the Lord He shall be like a tree planted by the waters which spreads out its roots by the river and will not fear when heat comes Its leaf will be green will not be anxious in the year of drought nor will cease from yielding fruit I want you to have a blessed and abundant life. God is saying and God wants us to enjoy the life that he gave us and he wants us to be blessed But as he's saying that notice verse when he says in the end surely this also is vanity My quest for knowledge left me unsatisfied as Did my quest for pleasure? I? Said verse 2 I said of laughter madness and mirth What does it accomplish? I searched in my heart how to gratify my flesh with wine while guiding my heart with wisdom and How do they hold on folly? Till I might see What was good for the sons of men to do under heaven all the days of their life? So I searched I Searched my heart. I said of laughter Even when you're trying to enjoy life We know this I'm speaking to people who will understand this if you're young and haven't learned this you will You can have everything you want in life and still be unsatisfied in Proverbs 14 verse 13 Even in laughter the heart may sorrow and the end of mirth may be grief So building your life on the pursuit of pleasure Always ends up falling short searching for pleasure results into satisfaction Whether it's alcohol or drugs Whether it's sex and money, whether it's gambling or fame Whether it's intellectual achievements all of this will leave you empty Why because these things do not satisfy your spiritual needs and so he's speaking of that He says in verse 3 said I searched in my heart how to gratify my flesh with wine while guiding my heart with wisdom How do they hold on folly? Till I might see what was good for the sons of men to do under heaven all the days of their lives I wanted to heal my flesh to wine while being Guided by my wisdom. I tried to indulge in alcohol and Yet guide my use of alcohol with spiritual Wisdom that's taking place even in our day by the way in many churches. There are pastors who Enjoy their alcohol and still are trying to guide their lives with spiritual wisdom Well Solomon can say that doesn't work He's saying I tried living in the flesh and in the spirit using wine to sweeten and wisdom to guide in other words I tried to party and yet remain spiritual at the same time. I Wanted to know if I could drink my fill of wine and still be a spiritual person Could the mixing of the two Result in satisfaction in life. I'm drinking the wine and wine is pleasurable, but I have my wisdom That's also pleasurable He says in verse 3. He says delay hold on folly until I might see what was good for the sons of men. I I pursued my flesh. I pursued carnal pleasure But this is folly. I Did it because I wanted to know the true way of contentment and Satisfaction by going deeply into these things. I thought I might learn something He says in verse 4. I Made my works great. I Built myself houses planted myself vineyards. I I made myself gardens and orchards I planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made myself water pools from which to water the growing trees of the Grove These things that I was trying Previous to this didn't satisfy. So I began looking other places. I began massive building projects. I tried to build a paradise on earth as God created Eden. I built massive buildings planted vineyards and orchards I had beautiful fruit trees and I Water pools and I did all of this for my pleasure. I created a landscaper's paradise But it was empty Anybody knows that starting a project can be fun and exciting. It can be yeah, we're gonna do it We're breaking ground. We've done that many times in this church many times and the first day is always the exciting day All right, let's do it I remember when we who purchased some property of the first property we as a church Purchase was on Maple Street in Ontario and and I was excited my my sons were both little boys And so I brought them to the the building site. We're tearing down some walls and I am I'm not a I'm not handy with the hammer and the saw, you know, I'm just not but I thought I'd pretend to be a man for a while and I I Went to do some destruction because that's I hear that that's a lot of fun So I did I went to this little building that we had and I Still remember I was telling my son, you know, you can just use a hammer and break this and now we're tearing this all down and I still remember going up to this light switch and I had a hammer and I peeled it out and and Two of the wires came out so I stuck my hand in to remove the box Yeah, and the wires One on one side the other and the other and I got the shock of my life I still remember just like that, you know, you can see my skeleton. It was really amazing To kind of show you something. I Remember pulling my hand out from between these live wires and my fingernail was on fire There was a blue fire and I got to remember I was a hippie and so I had a flashback. I looked at it going. Oh I'm moving it back and forth Then I realized I'm on fire We've done a lot of building projects the stage that I'm standing on right now Hardly any of any of you would remember this we built this stage This stage actually went to the edge of both sides of the walls here and and on one side on either side here There are some phony stained glass windows that we covered up and you know, we ripped up cart We've we've gone into building project after building project after building project. I could tell you it's exciting when it begins And after a while, when is this gonna end? I am so tired. We've got to get this done, right? Solomon understood that he had so many things that he did so many projects But there's an emptiness once it's completed. What's the point? Well being a workaholic isn't rewarding and Those who are workaholics find retirement very difficult He said in verse 7 he goes I acquired male and female servants and had servants born in my house Yes, I had greater possessions of herds and flocks and all who were in Jerusalem before me. I was wealthier Than the wealthiest that's what he's basically doing here when he's speaking of this. I I have wealth he purchased servants He had voluntary bond servants and when the bond servants had the children the children belong to Solomon So I had many in verse 8 He says I gathered for myself silver and gold and the special treasures of kings and of the provinces I acquired male and female singers the delights of the sons of men and Musical instruments of all kinds. I became great Excelled more than all who were before me in Jerusalem. Also My wisdom remained with me. I Was wealthy extremely so I I Received tribute from kings In first Kings it gives a lot of information about Solomon and his wealth and And for example in first Kings 9 verse 28 it says They sailed to offer and brought back to Solomon 16 tons of gold So he had quite a bit of money Somebody said Solomon inherited wealth from his father David Regularly received gold and silver from the kings of Arabia governors and merchants and heavily taxed his own people Solomon received tribute money from countries and kingdoms plus gold silver ivory animals Every three years due to his business partnership with the king of Tyre He garnered gifts of gold spices precious stones garments armor and So on each year from a variety of others. He ruled Israel 40 years We can safely assume his assets were in the multiple billions and billions of dollars. So Are the richest people satisfied to know Not if they seek contentment through money in Verse 8 and I want you to see this I Gathered for myself silver gold special treasures of kings and provinces I acquired male and female singers the delights of the sons of men Musical instruments of every kind. What is he speaking about? Well With wine and song came the delights of men though the lights of the sons of men speaks of sexual pleasure It speaks of his his harem First cream first Kings 11 verses 3 and 4 listen to this He had 700 wives of royal birth and 300 concubines and his wives led him astray Solomon grew old his wives turned his heart after other gods His heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God as the heart of David his father had been 700 wives 300 concubines He ain't that wise What if they all had PMS, can you imagine that at the same time? Unbelievable he knew how to throw a party in First Kings 4 22 and 23 listen to this Solomon's daily provisions Were about a hundred and eighty bushels of fine flour daily a hundred and eighty bushels of fine flour about 365 bushels of meal 10 head of stall-fed cattle 20 of pasture-fed cattle a hundred sheep and goats as well as deer gazelles robux and choice fowl daily a Bushel weighs 48 pounds He had 8,640 pounds of fine flour and 17,520 pounds of regular flour daily And that made a lot a lot of tortillas This is a guy who Whose meals rivaled the best restaurants were probably surpassing the the best restaurants. I Don't even know what the best restaurants are so I just came up with a list. I Hear that this there's a place called a French laundry Our governor likes it I Hear it's amazing Lowry's Ruth's Chris Fleming's whatever whatever you like He had that every day Every single day he got kind of boring not only that he had the best wine the best entertainment and the great Greatest luxurious dining you could imagine wine women and song And he's saying here Didn't satisfy me. I was empty. It's vanity. It's feudal. It's worthless. It doesn't mean anything Having great parties became tiresome They'd be noisy and people would be jockeying for his attention and that's one of the reasons I'm sure when he wrote Proverbs he said in Proverbs 15 16 and 17's better is a little with the fear of the Lord Then great treasure with trouble Better is a dinner of herbs where love is then a fatted calf with hatred in Proverbs 17 one better is a dry morsel with quietness Then a house full of feasting with strife It's like Thanksgiving so I Became great and I excelled more than all who were before me in Jerusalem. I Enjoyed my feasts. I tempered them with discretion I didn't yield myself completely to to heathenism or what used to be called debauchery Yeah, I did this while guiding my heart. He had said in verse 3 with wisdom In other words, I retained my reasoning through it all and what I was doing it was evaluating its results Verse 10 whatever my eyes desired. I didn't keep from him I didn't withhold my heart from any pleasure for my heart rejoicing all my laborer. This was my reward from all my laborer I Did all of this without denying myself Whatever I wanted I Could have There are there are people that we know of by perhaps you know him personally I I can't say that I know anybody exactly like this, but I can tell you I see him on the news all the time The different people that are spoken of it. They're incredible wealth and all of that you know and the Jeff Bezos and And and musk and others like that. I can't imagine What it would be like to be an Elon Musk will say he's very very very wealthy I don't know how much money he has but he has a lot to walk into a Car dealer sells Ferraris and To walk in and say I want it and the salesman will say which one all of them I Can buy them all it won't even you know He could drop a million dollars, and he's he's wasting money and time by bending down to pick it up I Mean this man has more money than we can imagine And I'm pretty sure if he had an honest moment an honest conversation I'm pretty sure he'd he'd say something similar to what Solomon said in that it doesn't really satisfy Because what satisfies me now isn't the money. It's the challenge And there were things like that that people people understand and so he's saying I became frustrated I I saw pleasure in and of itself for itself was was empty So what did I do? Well, I I return to considering if wisdom is fully satisfying You see drinking and building and and wealth and unending pleasures. Well, they're not he said Verse 11 I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled indeed always vanity Grasping for the wind. There's no profit under the Sun and Then he says so verse 12 I turned myself to consider wisdom and madness and folly For what can the man do who succeeds the king? Only what he's already done So he's contrasting madness and folly to see if wisdom is more satisfying He'd be especially speaking of the world's wisdom So we asked the question what can the man do who succeeds the king only what's already been done What I'm going to accomplish is duplicating what has been done and That would include that the fact that the the previous king is dead because the previous king is dead I'm going to die also So verse 13 I saw that wisdom excels folly is light excels darkness So madness and folly are disposed of as he's saying the wisdom excels folly Now wisdom alone. He's saying doesn't make us happy, but it does excel the folly of bane pleasure Why is that? Well light is more beneficial than dark on the outside folly may seem acceptable But it's actually simply a life of darkness and He illustrates this this is an interesting phrase look at verse 14. He says the wise man's eyes are in his head But the fool walks in darkness Yet I myself perceive that the same event happens to them all That's an interesting phrase the wise man's eyes are in his head The first time I ever heard that saying wasn't in the Bible The first time I ever heard that phrase was in a song and It wasn't a sung by a believer.  That's a biblical phrase That's what Solomon was saying right here when he speaks concerning the wise man's eyes are in his head It's a way of saying that a wise man walks with clear understanding The wise man can see pitfalls He can see possible problems on the path that he's taking but the one who is a fool walks in darkness and John 11 verse 10 Jesus said it like this if one walks in the night. He stumbles Because the light is not in him Because he's not walking in the light. He walks in the darkness and in the darkness. You'll always stumble So the one who's been enlightened by God sees the pitfalls and avoids them There may be a lust of the flesh. There may be a lust of the eyes. There may be a pride of life And we're aware of these kinds of things as believers Our eyes are in our head. We see the things that are going to result It may seem right now for example that if I do that thing whatever it may be That I'm gonna enjoy myself But a man with experience somebody who's gone through something knows that that doesn't always lead to the pleasure you think it will Like that guy who picked up a girl in the bar Took her home for for the night She got up earlier than he did he heard the door close as she left didn't even know her name Didn't even really know her just picked her up in a bar When he gets up he goes to his bathroom and on the bathroom mirror. She had written with her lipstick Welcome to the wonderful world of AIDS What he thought was just a night turned out to be his death and Somewhere along the line We have to learn from the experiences we go through and those of us who have grown and gone through things We can say things aren't always what they seem things aren't always Turning out the way we thought they would If I worked this hard or I do this or if I sacrifice that and we end up by ourselves My dad had a friend that he used to work with And my dad had four brats actually three brats and Me and my mom told me one day she said you know your dad has a friend who travels the world Now my father was in the Navy. He traveled the world and he had the traveling bug in him My dad wanted to travel Mama didn't so they didn't But he was jealous of this guy at work because the guy at work would speak to my father and say let me show you some of the Pictures I took while I was in Rome Let me show you some of the pictures I took when I and he I traveled the world And my my mom said that every time this guy would bring his pictures to show my dad My dad would get upset why because he had four brats and a wife That he had to take care of She says you want to hear something David and I said what mama?   I saw a lot But the one I traveled with is now no longer with me See the things you see is valuable now Later on you're gonna discover they're not And you may sometimes feel bad man. I wish I could I should have if I would have No You know if you're wise in the way that you live you invest in the things that matter and Solomon's saying a wise man's eyes are in his head He sees the sees the things in the future. He sees things before him But fools walks in darkness and he stumbles because he doesn't have the wisdom to see those things So for us as believers we we know that God is the one who provides light for us in Psalm 1828 The psalmist said it like this. He said you will light my lamp the Lord my God Will enlighten my darkness So what happens well verse 14 he says The same event happens to them all be both the the fool and the worldly wise Go through pain and both of them ultimately die so verse 15 I said in my heart as it happens to the fool it also happens to me and Why was I then more wise I said in my heart this also His vanity now both the wise men and the fool die and and both are soon forgotten Time has a way of erasing everything that we've done both the evil as well as the good Psalm 4910 says all can see that wise men die the foolish and the senseless alike perish and leave their wealth to others We all die. There's one way it was one thing, you know waiting us all, you know, that's not the most cheery thought But it's true. I've said this to you before when I was just before not just before a couple years before I got saved I was Driving with some friends were in Whittier My drug of choice because it was easy to get and it was very for me recreational my drug of choice was was a smoking weed And we're smoking weed. I said remember and we're driving it was raining and my two friends were in the front seat I was sitting alone in the back and I was very high and As we're driving I said, you know what guys what? We're not living.  What are you doing? Why are you saying that? I said cuz I'm thinking about it You know from them and I went into this philosophic thing. I'm 18. What do I know? But I said, you know from the time we were conceived in our mother's womb until this moment every single day We think we're alive. We're actually moving towards death They never got high with me again, but it was true But it's true. It's true So what are we doing to prepare? See that's the kind of things not marijuana didn't do that to me. It didn't make me think these things Be honest with you. I didn't get wise through smoking pot or dropping acid. I didn't It just made me start thinking about where's my life going and why am I doing this? And I came to that conclusion That I'm empty. I Have no purpose I'm just passing through and I'll never impact anybody. I Have no reason to be alive. I have no excuse for living. I Came to that conclusion and it was true Because without God all is vanity. I didn't know that I simply knew I'm lost. That's what brought me to faith in Christ What happens to the fool happens to the one who is worldly wise they both die That's a fact and so It's all vanity. Why was I verse 15 more wise? It's also vanity The pursuit of the wisdom of the world hasn't resulted in peace or contentment Worldly wisdom didn't exempt me from from pain What good is it? Well, he says in verse 17 therefore I hated life Because the work that was done under the Sun was distressing to me For all this vanity grasping for the wind I hated life because it didn't offer lasting satisfaction This is where so many are today hating life But not wanting to die again. Here's another old I was in this music mood forgive me another old one by Sam cook Change is going to come It's been too hard living. I'm afraid to die. I don't know what's up there beyond the sky That's a biblical thought. It's hard living, but I don't want to die. I don't for him I don't know what's waiting me. That's the person who has it all and had nothing and So what does he do? Well? He says in verse 18 I hated all my labor in which I had toiled into the Sun because I must leave it to the man who will Come after me and who knows whether he will be wise or a fool Yet he'll rule over all my labor in which I toiled and in which I have shown myself wise under the Sun. It's vanity I'm working myself to death. I'll die. I'll leave behind everything I work for and Somebody who didn't work a day in his life for this is gonna. He's gonna receive it What good is it? I'm not satisfied with all that. I've accumulated. I actually I'm actually frustrated The fruit of my work is gonna be left to someone who didn't work for it I remember my kids when they were in high school A couple of my kids said this to me. I'll never forget. They they talked to me and they said this They said hey dad my friend is rich My 14 year old kid my friend is rich and and I always had the same answer. I said no his parents are Kid didn't parents are Now he's not speaking about by the way proper stewardship obviously We leave things behind for our children Proverbs 1322 says a good person leaves an inheritance for their children's children a Center's wealth is stored up for the righteous I've made a and I'll say this quickly I encourage every person here who was able to put even a little bit away And this is not the heart of the serve sermon. I'm just kind of sharing this with you just briefly I think it's wise if you can To save Like my dad taught me that I think it's wise to do that. We used to call it for the rainy day You know, I think it's wise to do that and I've been doing that for a long long time So that should the Lord take me home Then I and I just talked to my kids about this recently I said if when he takes me home and more than likely before he Before my my wife goes I'll go I told my kids.  That's my job. That's what I do That's what men do for their families and for the wives That's what I do and I don't want you kids to feel obligated to have to take care of Your mother when her husband should have done that for her and I believe that with all of my heart and So one of my kids said well dad, you know, you got to spend some on yourself Spend it on something you like and I said I am and spending it on your mom Because I like her it makes sense to me Proverbs 13 22 a good person leaves an inheritance for the children's children the sinner's wealth is stored up for the righteous It is right to leave something behind for your kids. It's proper stewardship Stewardship and doing so is wise it can be an investment in eternity So you leave things behind in your will for your children your trust for your charities, whatever But why was he in a state of despair? It's because he knew that he couldn't keep what he worked so hard to get He couldn't protect it from somebody who's going to waste it So in verse 19, who knows whether he's going to be wiser or fool Yet he will rule over all my labor in which I told and in which I've shown myself wise under the sun This is vanity Therefore I turned my heart in and a spared of all the labor in which I had toiled under the sun Somebody is going to end up with all my efforts. They could care less about it They they don't know what it took to gain these riches and they'll just spend it and won't think he said that's vanity There is a man verse 21 whose labor is with wisdom knowledge and skill yet He must leave his heritage to a man who hasn't labored for it This is vanity a great evil for what has a man What has man for all his labor and and for the striving of his heart with which he's toiled under the sun all His days are sorrowful his work burdensome even in the night his heart takes no rest. It's also vanity We can have sleepless nights Concerned about those things, but our heirs never experience it You can worry about well, what's going to happen and when you're worried about that it brings misery What are they going to do with the money? I left them. Will they be wise? Are they just going to spend it? You know at one time, you know when we're putting together a living trust in all eyes This is 20 some years ago. I told the guy who was doing the work. I said, I'm gonna I said I'm not gonna have them receive Everything in bulk sub in in bulk.  He'll be driving a Ferrari the next day if he can Now you have to be aware of those kinds of things So what's he would see come up to verse 24? Nothing's better for a man than a shitty drink that his soul should enjoy good In his labor This also I saw was from the hand of god for who can eat Or who can have enjoyment more than I For god gives wisdom and knowledge and and joy to a man who's good in his sight but to the sinner He gives the work of gathering and collecting that he may give to him Who's good before god? This also is vanity grasping for the wind So life He says Is a gift from god What's evil Is having blessings of life and and not enjoying them He says in verse 26 god gives wisdom and knowledge and joy To a man who's good Well god desires to give wisdom god desires to give us knowledge and he wants us to have joy He wants us to enjoy working. He wants us to produce the great works He wants us to enjoy the pleasures that we can have the pleasures of marriage Of parenthood if you will he wants us to have financial security Why because he wants to bless us as we serve him He wants that for us But not so he says with the sinner. Why is that? Well, they left god out Ultimately their lives are toil and no rest That's what happens Again a good man leaves an inheritance to his children children, but the wealth of the sinner stored up for the righteous So enjoyment of life Always will find at its center A relationship with god Psalm 116 verse 7 return to your rest oh my soul for the lord is dealt bountifully with you You can put your head on your pillow at night and you can rest why because Because you're walking with the lord Whatever has come into your life and i'll close it with this thought whatever is coming to your life up to this point Has had a had to go through one thing first and that is the will of god That is one of the more deep lessons that you're going to learn as a believer Because there are things that we may experience That we do not see the value of now We just don't see it Because all we can see at the moment is the difficulty that we may be experiencing and all i've worked so hard It doesn't seem like Anything results But i can tell you God makes it good When you take care of the things he gives you he produces fruit in your life my son My son's son my son grandson david david erin junior Got some seeds And he said let's plant these seeds pop on he said sure why not So i got a little small pot Through some dirt in it took his seeds Put the seeds in it covered it up with dirt watered it put it in the sun Left it there about four or five six weeks later He walks up and says are my seeds growing? They're dead Why? Well, you got to take care of them You got to water them They don't just grow up by themselves And you know what I think that's a lesson you learn in life You take care of the things that god gave to you you use them according to his will You invest those things in other people You may not see the fruit of it immediately because it takes time for the seeds to produce But one day they do And one day you reap the benefits and the pleasures and the joys of the labor Well, you sowed and you watered but god gave the increase And in your life it's very similar a life without god is going to prove to be without meaning But a life that is centered on the lord Even though you may go through difficult times, you're going to come to the conclusion to fear god And to serve him with all that you have why? Because what was meant at one time perhaps to be evil What you've gone through that has been so hurtful that you don't think you can survive it And you put your head on your pillow at night and you can hardly breathe you're in such turmoil and grief and sorrow And one day later on is going to prove to be something god uses in you to make you into the person you wanted to be all along And what you may have used what may have been Something you cried about and heard about and sighed over god can turn that around Because god can teach you to see him in the midst of all the futility that's in the world See with in the world, there's nothing but vanity But in god There's purpose And that's what solemn and his talent is bit by bit little here a little there I've done all of these things And I found and you'll say at the end without god it was nothing But now I know him I know him in a deeper way And I can tell you it's all centered On him and we'll see that as we go through chapter by chapter as it go through so many different things that we'll identify with And incidentally next week as we get into chapter three It'll be another old song that you'll have a chance to see