DWS Country Programs
Cambodia
Local food produce in the Oral district. Food processing course for income generation activities funded by the LWF. |
After nearly a decade of international reconstruction, the need for assistance in Cambodia remains strong, with 36 percent of the population living below the poverty line. Most of the poor live in rural areas, facing the daily challenges of landmines, food shortages, malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, poor education, land grabbing and limited access to water. Emergency relief responds to periodic flooding and drought.
The LWF/DWS Cambodia Program works with vulnerable groups, such as poor farmers, households headed by women, landless families, returnees, internally displaced persons, rural youth and people with HIV/AIDS in remote and isolated areas.
Since 2003, the emphasis of the program is empowerment of communities for their own sustainable development, combined with rights based integrated development and advocacy approaches. The program has evolved since its start in 1979 just after the Khmer Rouge Regime. Early sustained work in the agriculture and water supply sectors to support central government then shifted in 1995 to community based activities with Integrated Rural Development Projects, and is shifting again with empowerment activities.
Integrated Rural Development through Empowerment Project (IRDEP)
A farmer ploughs land after the rice harvest season in the Kampong Speu province, Cambodia. |
With a rights based approach, this project facilitates the empowerment of people, households and communities to achieve their human rights. Eight sectoral components are offered as integrated entry points, based on community identified needs, to facilitate capacity building and empowerment for sustainable development. These activities include: community organization and infrastructure building; food security and agriculture development; income generation; human rights awareness and advocacy; primary health care and HIV/AIDS; water and sanitation; primary education to children and non-formal education to adults; environmental protection and management; and disaster preparedness.
Capacity Building and Community Participation
Building capacity is a process that enhances, mobilizes and combines individual and organizational assets from the community, in order to achieve community-building goals. The program’s holistic and integrated approach emphasizes participation, partnerships and networking. For example, community development workers cooperate closely with Village Development Committees to help households build their confidence and skills in managing their individual and community affairs. As the capacity of communities to provide or obtain development services grows, the program gradually withdraws its personnel and resources, until the community "graduates," enabling staff to move on to other needy communities.
Vocational Training Center
The aims of the Vocational Training Center are to develop the school’s self-reliance and to improve the quality of training for apprentices of the region so they can obtain technical qualifications in building vocational skills. The school is a government institution which has received more than ten years of LWF/DWS Program assistance to renovate the facility and train the staff, and now is in the last phase of returning management to the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport.
Web site of the LWF/DWS Cambodia program.
For further information please contact:
Ms Elsa Moreno, Program Officer
Local representative
Mr David H. Mueller, Regional Representative
