Asia: Cambodia and UNICEF - Venture Magazine Issue #3 Pages 22-23
Spotlight on Cambodia
Cambodia beckons travellers with the bustle of Phnom Penh and the splendour of 13th-Century Khmer temples.
While you’ll be overcome by the wonder of Cambodia, there are constant reminders of the country’s tragic history. It’s hard not to think that the country roads were once heavily mined, and that the dry rice paddies were once Pol Pot’s killing fields.
But while the scars of thirty years of conflict are evident in Cambodia’s physical landscape, it is the country’s young people that have been hit the hardest.
Children constitute roughly half of Cambodia’s population and are among the poorest in the world. Cambodia has the highest infant mortality rates in East Asia. For every 1000 live births, 97 babies will not survive and another 141 will die before their fifth birthday.
The saddest part of this story is the fact that many of these deaths are from water-borne diseases such as diarrhoea that could be prevented if communities simply had access to safe drinking water.
Figures from 2004 indicate that only 13 per cent of the Cambodian rural population have access to adequate sanitation, while only 32 per cent have access to safe water.
UNICEF works for children and communities in Cambodia under the “Seth Koma” programme – meaning “child rights” in Khmer. Improving water and sanitation is one component of this programme, and is key to ensuring that children realise their right not only to survive, but to thrive to adulthood.
To help UNICEF raise money for the world’s neediest children, for every tour booked to Asia, Kumuka donates AUD$50/ GBP£20 to UNICEF water and sanitation projects in the region. In addition, for tours booked through the UNICEF Australia website Kumuka donates 10 per cent of the tour cost to UNICEF. This money is crucial in ensuring that children and their families can stay nourished and healthy, and can protect themselves from water-borne disease.
In Cambodia, UNICEF works closely with schools and villages, providing hand-pump wells and latrines and teaching communities about safe water and hygiene practices.
UNICEF also works to address arsenic poisoning, or arsenicosis, which is becoming an increasing problem in Cambodia, particularly in the Mekong River basin. This is a result of ground-water being contaminated by arsenic, and can result in skin lesions, swollen limbs and can lead to cancer.
To create lasting change for Cambodian communities, UNICEF also works with the local governments to ensure that water and sanitation are made priorities in community planning. They train and provide information to government workers so that targets in this area can be achieved.
Seth Koma water and sanitation projects have been very effective in reducing disease and improving nutrition and health in Cambodia. The projects have been implemented in six rural provinces, covering a population of 1.4 million people. By December 2006, a total of 125 latrines and 78 wells had been constructed and this work continues.
Kumuka’s support has been crucial to this programme. By booking your Asian adventure with Kumuka, you will provide UNICEF with vital funds for water and santation projects in the region, and will help ensure that more children in Cambodia live to celebrate many more birthdays.
Travelling in 2007?
Here’s a great way that you can see the world and help UNICEF protect thousands of vulnerable children.
- Simply book your next tour with Kumuka, and they will donate AUD$50/GBP£20 to UNICEF for every person who travels with us.
- Travelling to Asia? By booking with Kumuka you’ll help UNICEF water and sanitation projects in the region. Why not try our 6-day HIDDEN DYNASTIES tour of Cambodia?
- Travelling to Europe? Booking a tour with Kumuka will help UNICEF protect children in the region from violence and abuse.
- Travelling to South or Central America? Booking through Kumuka will provide UNICEF with funds for education projects for children in the region.
- Travelling to Africa or the Middle East? By booking with Kumuka, you’ll provide vital funds for UNICEF’s HIV/AIDS projects in this region.
Supporting UNICEF
Why is Kumuka supporting UNICEF?
UNICEF is the United Nation’s Children’s Fund.
UNICEF works closely with children, women and communities
as well as governments, other UN agencies, non-government
organisations and the private sector on behalf of the world’s
most vulnerable children. Through contact with UNICEF the
lives of millions of children have been saved or changed
for the better.
But the challenge is still ongoing:
- More than 10 million children around the world die each year before their fifth birthday, many from preventable and treatable causes such as diarrhoea, malnutrition and respiratory infections.
- Nearly 115 million children are not enrolled in school
- 15.2 million children under the age of 18 have lost one or both parents to AIDS.
- Around 1.2 million children are trafficked worldwide every year.
For more information about UNICEF Australia, please visit www.unicef.org.au.
