3. Foreword
I am pleased to introduce a new edition of CDRI’s Economic Lexicon, an English-
Khmer and Khmer-English guide to technical terms in economics and related fields
such as accounting, banking, finance, and development. CDRI's recent experience
in publishing, and contributing to a range of publications, conferences, seminars
and workshops, has shown that there is a real need for such a resource to assist
stakeholders in Cambodia's development to use more standard and easily
understood terms in Khmer and English when writing about development issues.
Our new 2006-10 Strategic Plan includes a commitment to produce research
products that are more flexible and appropriate for Cambodia. This new edition of
the Economic Lexicon is an expression of that commitment. We hope that it will
help promote the expansion of development material originally written in Khmer,
and the quality of translation from English material into Khmer.
The lexicon is in two parts. Part 1: The English-Khmer Lexicon, is a revision and
expansion of the last edition published in 1995. Over the past 10 years there have
been many developments in technical language. This is especially true for the
Khmer language, where many new words have been created and many others have
changed their meaning or become more specific. Also, many more technical
Khmer documents are being produced by various institutions taking different
approaches to the use of language.
CDRI, like many other institutions, publishes technical and policy documents on a
wide range of development-related topics. Wherever possible, CDRI's editorial
team makes great efforts to use words that are already in use in official documents
and to refrain from creating new words. This is not always easy as official
documents may use different Khmer words to express the same meaning, so
choices have to be made as to what would be the most commonly understood word
or term. Sometimes a new word or term needs to be used for a new concept which
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4. does not yet have a specific translation in Khmer. Wherever possible a
combination of simple words is used to express any new idea or concept.
Part II, The Khmer-English Lexicon, is new. It has been compiled in response to
requests from many of our readers who may have some difficulty with Khmer
technical terms, especially new ones. Where there is no exact equivalent, this
lexicon provides the nearest translation. It does not contain a detailed explanation
for each word, and the reader is advised to use the English word to further research
its meaning. The reason the lexicon contains many headwords of Pali or Sanskrit
origin is that their meaning is not immediately obvious to the general public.
Wherever any one particular word is not very much in use, the reader is referred to
another word more frequently used or more readily understandable.
Extensive research and the opinions of many people have gone into the
compilation of this lexicon. CDRI would like to thank everyone who has
contributed to this final product. We hope this lexicon will serve as a tool to help
readers to make better use of both CDRI publications and the broader development
literature. We see the lexicon as a continuous ''work in progress' so would welcome
any comments or suggestion from readers to help improve and expand on the
current edition.
Larry Strange
Executive Director CDRI
October 2006
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