Cambodia has one of the world’s largest disabled populations, including an estimated 43,000 landmine survivors and 50,000 people affected by polio. In a country where the average income is less than 50p a day, disabled people are the poorest of the poor. Discriminated against at every level of society, they are seen as ‘useless’; a burden on the family, and the community. While they are excluded from education and employment opportunities, they remain dependent; trapped in the cycle of poverty. Disabled women and children living in the poorer rural areas are particularly disadvantaged.

The Cambodia Trust's aim is to reduce poverty and gain equality for disadvantaged disabled people. They are appealing for your support to enable disadvantaged disabled people to reduce their poverty, increase their self-sufficiency, and enjoy full human rights. Your grant would be used to support the following projects, run from their rehabilitation centres in Sihanoukville and Kompong Chhnang:

1. Physical rehabilitation

– restoring mobility and dignity

- Making and fitting prosthetic limbs and orthopaedic braces, to improve the mobility of people disabled by landmines or affected by polio, cerebral palsy, club foot and other conditions.

- Providing transport and dormitory accommodation to enable people to attend our rehabilitation centres in Sihanoukville and Kompong Chhnang.

- Providing mobility aids such as crutches and wheelchairs.

- Training family members to provide physiotherapy at home.

2. Support for disabled adults to gain employment

– breaking the cycle of poverty

- Providing small grants and loans to enable people to set up small businesses in their communities.

- Ensuring that disabled adults have equal access to micro credit and skills training courses.

- Promoting equal rights to education and health care for disabled people.

Cost effectiveness:

• Physical rehabilitation: The average cost of the materials used to make a prosthetic limb if just £25. Devices are made to standards set down by the International Society for Prosthetics and Orthotics. Prosthetic limbs or braces wear out and need replacing every year or so for adults; every 6 months or sooner for growing children. Wheelchairs are made locally and cost £75.
• Supporting disabled adults into employment: The average size of a grant to enable an adult to set up their own business is £30-40. Grants are used to buy, for example, chickens or sewing machines.

The impact of this work:

By enabling disabled people to participate in skills training, income generation and community activities, we are helping them to take important steps towards independence and social inclusion. The cycle of poverty begins to break and gradually, disabled people are being seen as able people, with equal rights. In 2005, our local staff:

• Made small grants to 60 disabled adults to help them set up small businesses
• Fitted 743 prosthetic limbs and 1,160 orthopaedic braces
• Repaired 2,314 prosthetic limbs or braces, extending the life span of these devices
• Distributed 107 wheelchairs
• Gave 1,725 physiotherapy assessments and 4,918 physiotherapy sessions
• Supported the establishment of 22 community self-help groups

Rath Rorn is a 52-year-old woman who supports her 16-year-old daughter. Rorn is a double amputee who had a landmine accident while foraging for food.

She lives in her shop, selling fruit, Khmer traditional cakes and drinks. Her shop is made of palm leaf and is prone to leaking during the rainy season. In the past she was desperate to improve her living conditions and was forced to borrow money at a high interest rate from a neighbour. During this time she was only able to earn a very small income and was not able to repay her neighbour.

Tuy One is a 49-year-old woman who lives in Odong District. She lost her leg in a landmine accident in 1986 in Kandal Province and we provide her with artificial limbs to aid her mobility. She is a widow with two daughters; they live as squatters on the edge of the public lake, using the resources at hand to survive.

Tuy One approached the Cambodia Trust to help her to establish a small vegetable farm on the lake. Staff discussed various small business options with her and she determined that she could grow lily grass – an aquatic vegetable sold in the markets and used in traditional Khmer soups. Cambodian-style hydroponics are used to cultivate this fast-growing vegetable. We provided Tuy One with a small grant to enable her to buy enough plants to start her business. With the sale of her first harvest, she was able to purchase further plants and over the last 6 months has had a continual planting season.

Tuy One is one of the ‘poorest of the poor’. She has no land and lives in a hut made of palm leaves. Until now her only income has been from planting rice seedlings for 2000 riel ($US 50 cents) a day. Her one desire is to generate enough income so that she and her daughters can be self-reliant. Now that she has her own small business, she is one step closer to achieving this dream.

Mrs Vat Soeun is a 67 year woman who suffered a landmine injury in Battambang in 1980. She first came to the Cambodia Trust in 1989 where she received a below-knee artificial limb and physiotherapy. Local project workers undertook a thorough assessment of her social situation and found that she met our criteria for a small business grant.

Vat Soeun is a physically fit older woman who is responsible for caring for her 14 year-old granddaughter. Because she was struggling to support herself financially, Soeun had to take her granddaughter out of school.

Ly Thavy, a Cambodia Trust Community-based Rehabilitation (CBR) Worker, has worked with Vat Soeun to help her establish a small business raising chickens. Through this project, we were able to provide a small grant which Soeun used to purchase nine chickens. The financial self-sufficiency which this business will bring will enable Soeun’s granddaughter to return to school.

Chan Bros was affected by polio as a child and as a result he needs orthopaedic braces to improve his mobility.

With support from the Cambodia Trust’s CBR staff, Bros was able to attend a one-year motorbike mechanics course run by a Japanese NGO (AAR Japan), which gave him the skills he needed to develop a successful business. Bros has now used a small business grant to establish his own motorbike repair shop. He is very skilled at buying old motorbikes, stripping them down and making new ones. He is now in a position where he is able to pass on his skills to other people in his community.

_____________________________________________________________________