Americans for UNFPA Leadership Trip to Cambodia
January 2006

UNFPA in Cambodia: Building Capability

This small girl lives in a shantytown on the edge of the city dump outside Phnom Penh. People live there by scavenging from the dump and selling what they find.

People live like this because Cambodia is a poor country. At least in part, Cambodia is poor because the country is still suffering from the destruction of its people and institutions under the genocidal Khymer Rouge. UNFPA in Cambodia is working to rebuild Cambodia's organizational infrastructure to help women and children escape from her profound poverty.

I met this woman with representatives of the WOMEN project, supported by UNFPA, which helps these poor children receive an education. The WOMEN project also provides reproductive health education and services to their parents, helps those living with HIV/AIDS, provides vocational training and helps to sell the products they make. The people living by the dump were the poorest of the poor, living on the absolute margins of what was already the margins of Cambodian society.

By supporting organizations that provide such services, UNFPA helps to build the Cambodian capability to educate women and children. With a modest knowledge of health they can look after themselves and their children better. With better health, and some education, women are able to earn their own living, giving them more control over their lives in every way, and a better future for themselves and their families.