IFAD in Cambodia

Since 1996, IFAD has invested US$48.3 million in five projects in Cambodia, which have mobilized overall investments for a total of US$100.6 million, IFAD loans support rural and agricultural development and improvement of the livestock subsector. Reducing rural poverty by improving rural livelihoods is the objective of the organization’s efforts to empower Cambodia’s poor people to raise their incomes and standards of living.

In particular, IFAD’s initiatives focus on helping poor rural people by improving agricultural productivity and service delivery. IFAD-funded activities target the poorer sections of the rural population, including women, and they pilot innovative approaches to community empowerment.

IFAD's strategy

The Country Strategic Opportunities Programme (COSOP), which covers the period from 2008 to 2012, supports the government’s poverty reduction initiatives. The programme has the dual aims of reducing rural poverty and promoting the growth of the rural economy.

IFAD’s country programme has two main objectives.

• improving poor rural people’s livelihoods in a sustainable manner through community empowerment and through improving productivity and access to assets, productive resources, rural services, rural infrastructure and markets
• promoting decentralization and deconcentration of local governance for pro-poor agricultural and rural development

IFAD-funded activities target the provinces with the highest rates of poverty and, within those provinces, the poorest people and communities. The poorest groups include:

• poor rural households with access to only small areas of land and no other productive assets who are likely to be food insecure and in debt, with little if any access to off-farm employment opportunities
• landless rural people who are willing to learn skills for livestock raising, off-farm income-generating activities or wage employment
• women and households headed by women with a large number of dependents
• other poor rural households such as those in indigenous ethnic minority communities 

The participatory approach toward community development is at the core of IFAD-financed initiatives. It has the aim of building the capacity of grass-roots institutions and fostering direct ownership of investment programmes by the people who benefit from them.

IFAD  works in partnership with the government and with multilateral and bilateral agencies and international NGOs in Cambodia. In agreement with the government, future assistance will target areas where poverty rates are high and where there are opportunities to improve agricultural productivity and develop strategic partnerships with other agencies. In this perspective, future support will be directed at areas where no major externally financed development programmes are ongoing. Potential target areas include the country’s more remote border provinces.

Source: IFAD

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Ongoing IFAD operations Rural Livelihoods Improvement Project in Kratie, Preah Vihear and Ratanakiri Rural Poverty Reduction Project in Prey Veng and Svay Rieng Community-Based Rural Development Project in Kampong Thom and Kampot Statistics Projects: 5 Total cost: US$100.6 million Total loan amount: US$48.3 million Directly benefiting: 425,300 households Contact information Mr Youqiong Wang Country programme manager IFAD Via Paolo Di Dono, 44 00142 Rome, Italy Tel: +39 0654592076 Fax: +39 0654593076 y.wang@ifad.org