Making aid effective | Governance | Health | HIV/AIDS | Education | Water/sanitation/infrastructure | Natural resources
In 2008-09, we provided over £16 million in assistance to Cambodia. Our support will rise to £22 million in 2010/11.
As Cambodia receives significant, if fragmented, development funding from external donors, DFID’s focus is on working with the Cambodian government and donors to make sure that that funding makes a greater impact. We plan to reduce the number of projects and sectors that we support and channel our assistance primarily through other development partners. We have also funded the first comprehensive assessment of poverty in Cambodia.
We began providing Poverty Reduction Budget Support (PRBS) in 2007 and will, over time, increase the share of the assistance we give through this, as the risk of corruption declines.
Central challenges to the Cambodian government in achieving its development plans are:
DFID supports reforms to tackle tough governance issues and to strengthen public accountability.
As a result of our support for financial reforms, senior staff are now paid through the banking system, internal audit departments have been established, and the Cambodians have seen a 19% increase in tax revenue.
With the health of Cambodian citizens being among the poorest in South-east Asia, DFID contributed £15.4 million to the Health Sector Support Project (2003-08. This provided backing for the government's Health Sector Strategic Plan, which aims to increase access to quality health services, especially by mothers and children.
Reducing maternal mortality is one of DFID’s priorities. Cambodia’s population is growing at about 2.5% per year, and there is an unmet need for family planning services. In 2006, DFID launched a £2.3 million programme to reduce the number of women dying from unsafe abortion (thought to account for 30% of maternal deaths). By the end of 2008 an additional 129 midwives and doctors had been trained in the delivery of safe abortion care.
Malaria is widespread in Cambodia. DFID has provided $1.24 million to support the national programme to control and prevent the disease.
HIV/AIDS remains a major threat in Cambodia. Although its prevalence among adults declined from 2.6% in 1996 to 0.8% in 2007, transmission patterns are shifting: most new infections now occur among married women and their children.
We currently support the government’s response to HIV. This includes such initiatives as HIV/AIDS education – prevention classes in schools have involved 145,000 children – as well as prevention, testing, care and stigma reduction. Treatment has expanded rapidly and now reaches 73% of all eligible adult patients.
We also have also given (through USAID) £7.5 million towards a social marketing programme that aims to increase knowledge, awareness and the use of condoms (and other family planning methods) and reduce high-risk behaviour associated with HIV transmission.
Net primary school enrolment in Cambodia increased from 76% to 91% between 1997 and 2005. The quality and affordability of education also improved. However, there’s significant gender inequality in education: while virtually equal numbers of boys and girls enrol in primary school, about 20% fewer girls enter secondary education.
Water and sanitation have not received sufficient attention in Cambodia - nearly 50% of households lack a safe water supply in the dry season and 80% have inadequate sanitation. Through Unicef, we’re supporting the Ministry of Rural Development with a three-year £1.2 million project to improve the leadership, management and financing of the sanitation sector.
With funding of £16.9 million (2001-06), DFID has also been a significant donor to the government’s Seila rural development programme. Through this, 4 million of the poorest Cambodians in all 24 provinces – about a third of the population – have benefited from better roads, schools, wells and basic infrastructure, as well as having a greater say in local decision-making. We’ll be providing an additional £9.5 million over the next three years to support the national follow-on programme.
DFID is very concerned about allegations of deforestation, land-grabbing, illegal logging, criminal activity and the intimidation of communities and human rights defenders. We strongly urge Cambodia to fully implement the Forest Law and the sub-decree on economic land concessions.
We are contributing £13.7 million to an innovative five-year rural livelihoods programme managed by the Danish development agency Danida. This will help 4.5 million poor people increase their incomes, participate in the management of their natural resources and benefit from improved regulation of fisheries, forestry and land management. In addition, our budget-support programme will deliver 550,000 new land titles and redistribute 25,000 hectares of land to the poor.
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