International experts and Cambodian officials have expressed confidence that the rubber market and revenues would rise significantly in the years to come, local press reported yesterday.

Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Sok An told the Third ASEAN Rubber Conference that the market price for natural rubber has sky-rocketed over the last six years from 500 U.S. dollars per ton in 2001 to around 2,000 U.S. dollars per ton in 2007, the Cambodia Daily newspaper reported.

Natural rubber prices should remain strong so long as oil prices petroleum being used to create synthetic rubber continue to be high, Sok An was quoted by the newspaper as saying.

Cambodia has 500,000 hectares of land with soil conditions ideal for rubber trees, he said.

"We have potential with the land, but we have not used it well," he added.

Cambodia currently has around 70,000 hectares devoted to rubber cultivation, but substantial expansion of production is expected, Teng Lao, the secretary of State at the Cambodian Agriculture Ministry in charge of rubber, was quoted as saying.

"Our estimate for 2015, the planting areas in total can be up to 150,000 hectares, and production will be 150,000 tons," he said.

Hidde Smith, the secretary general for the secretariat of the UK-based International Rubber Study Group, said rubber prices will continue to increase due to rising demand for car tires in Europe, China and India.

Around 400 rubber experts, producers, buyers and sellers gathered here for the three-day conference, which ends Saturday, the newspaper said.

According to a recent study by the Association for Rubber Development in Cambodia, Cambodia exported 60,000 tons of natural rubber last year at a value of 83 million U.S. dollars, accounting for less than one percent of the rubber produced globally, it said.