Annual Report 2005

A Belgium-Cambodia Joint Meeting was held in Brussels at the end of May 2001.

Two main sectors were included in the cooperation programme: health care and education, in accordance with the priorities of the beneficiary country and those of Belgium in the field of development cooperation.

Initially, the scope of the projects was supposed to cover the provinces of Siem Reap and Kampong Cham, but an extension was jointly accepted to include the bordering province of Otdar Meanchey, which was particularly hard hit by poverty. 

In a bid to develop the economy of Cambodia and facilitate access to international markets, a series of complementary activities affecting waterborne transport in the Mekong river basin were intergrated into an extensive Cooperation gives €17,500,000 to the education and health care sectors, with the total amount released by Belgium within the framework of direct bilateral cooperation equating to €20,546,000.

Education

The whole educational system continues to suffer from the Khmer Rouge years and the periods of instability which ensued, with a lack of qualified teachers, obsolete teaching methods, insufficient or deteriorating infrastructures, and limited access to schooling due to extreme poverty. The project is established in the three abovementioned provinces.

The main aim of the BETT (Basic Education and Teacher Training) project is to restore access to primary and lower secondary education for the most underprivileged people and for young girls who are usually kept at home to carry out domestic chores and work in the fields. The implementation of a grant system with a high level of community participation successfully contributes to increasing attendance and considerably reducing the number of students who abandon their studies, especially girls. 

Infrastructures are seriously lacking and those remaining are in such a poor state that 50% of the budget is currently used to build or restore high-quality schools adapted to the climate, the environment and the new teaching strategies adopted in Cambodia. Teacher training institutions are also being renovated and built.

The third components of the project launched in 2006 consists of developing the necessary tools for new, more participative teaching methods which meet today's standards. 

Health care

The 'Provision of Basic Health Services' project is carried out in the same provinces. 

Access to health care for all and the improvement of its quality are priorities for the Ministry of Health. For the same reasons as the education sector, the health care sector has also been greatly affected by Cambodia's grim past. Health care remains one of the main causes of debt for a population teetering on the brink. 

The Provision of social funds by the project until a future medical insurance support system has been implemented enables the poorest people (30 to 40% of the population) to receive the care they need. 

The contractualisation of health care staff and requirements to meet quality criteria result in better care for patients. 

At the same time, internal and external training is provided to health care staff. 

Special emphasis is placed on patients' rights as health care consumers, the change in behaviour of health care staff and the better understanding of how populations make use of health care services.

It now appears that more and more inhabitants are slowly beginning to seek health care services in the once-deserted medical structures.

Master plan for waterborne transport in the Mekong river basin

The latest project related to the Mekong basin follows on two other completed projects, and is taking shape with the drafting of an ambitious master plan aimed at overseeing shipping activities on the Cambodian side of the river for twenty years to come, encompassing aspects regarding infrastructures, ports, piers, riverbanks, drainage, signaling and the categorisation of boats, as well as those relating to administration, customs, diplomacy, the law, the environment and river security. 

Its aim is to develop river and maritime transport in order to improve the socioeconomic situation in Cambodia, and to integrate it into a regional or even international framework, by providing it with an outlet to the Pacific Ocean. A group of national and international consultants are working in their fields of specialisation to help to ensure that this ambitious project will be a success. 

The training facility

This 'pilot' project contributes to the fight against poverty by providing training adapted to the socioeconomic situation in Cambodia. Its flexible decentralised management is able to provide an immediate response to needs, under the supervision of a joint Belgium-Cambodia selection committee.

Groups of people or individuals from the public or private sector involved in development have access to short- or long-term training, prearranged or tailor-made, covering everything from foreign language learning and information technology, to more scientific or vocational training aimed at improving their capacities. Master's degrees and 'study tours' are also organised. 

These activities take place in the country itself and in the ASEAN region.