After a prolonged civil war, Cambodia needed more than roads clinics and schools. It needed local government that worked. Charlie Pye-Smith reports.

Before the commune council built an all-weather road linking Chambak village to the outside world, farmers only got rock-bottom prices for their crops. It was hard for them to get to market and merchants seldom ventured down the rough track that meandered towards the village through old minefields. “I was nearly always in debt and I had trouble finding enough food to feed my family,” recalls Kong Chhork.

Since the new road was built, farmers’ incomes have significantly improved. Now they can sell fresh cassava instead of the dried variety and net three times the price. “I’m no longer in debt,” says Chhork proudly, “and I can even afford to send my children to school”. He’s also been able to buy a two-wheeled tractor and more land.

Almost everywhere you go in rural Cambodia, you’ll meet villagers who’ll tell you how a new project – a road or a well, a community fishery or a health clinic, a scholarship scheme for poor children or an eco-tourism venture – is making a difference to their lives. All this in a country where the civil war didn’t end till the late 1990s. Nobody’s claiming that Cambodia has been transformed from a conflict-ridden state into an Asian tiger; it’s still much poorer than most of its neighbours. But there has been real progress, and much of the credit must go to local government reforms.

When Western donors began to return to the country in 1991 – a decade and a half after the Khmer Rouge’s genocidal rule had been ended – they found a country in ruins. Their first task was to help rebuild the shattered infrastructure. But it soon became clear that it was more than just roads, clinics, and schools that were needed – it was vital to create government structures which would support long-term development and ‘win the peace’.

Local government reforms, supported by DFID, the United Nations Development Programme and the Swedish International Development Agency, created incentives which encouraged once warring factions to work together. They also established the administrative systems – the nuts and bolts of good governance – which have enabled the government and foreign donors to channel aid to the rural poor. “Every pound we’ve spent has mobilised a further £2 of aid from other donors,” explains DFID’s Tom Wingfield. “Between 2001 and 2006, around £100 million of foreign aid, from 10 different donors, was channeled through the systems we helped to establish.”

One of the greatest achievements of the local government reforms has been the creation of directly elected Commune councils. People who were powerless for decades, and ignored by the political and military élites, can now articulate their needs and make real choices about their future. Each Commune has an annual budget which Communes can spend as they see fit. Most opt for basic infrastructure, such as roads, canals, classrooms, bridges and wells. Such relatively modest projects can transform people’s lives. Take, for example, Krang Svay commune’s decision to restore an old canal. Restoration work began in 2006. Two years later around 160 families were benefiting from a year-round supply of irrigation water. Before the canal was restored, Kao Ly used to get just one crop of rice a year, not enough to feed her large family. Now she and her husband have tripled that yield. “We no longer have to buy rice,” says Ly, “and we’re getting a surplus of vegetables to sell in the market.” They now have enough money to send all their children to school, and they can pay for medical treatment when anyone falls sick. None of this would have happened without the local government reforms. Does this mean that the reforms have been an unqualified success? “No”, says Wingfield. Although some donors, such as the World Bank, have worked closely with central and local government, others continue to operate independently, financing projects of their own choosing, which bypass the systems set up by local government reforms. Often these activities fail to engage legitimate elected representatives, explains Wingfield.

Coordination between donors and the government departments responsible for overseeing the management of fisheries, forestry and land is key to making aid work effectively in Cambodia. This is why DFID and Danish Development Assistance (Danida) set up the Multi-Donor Livelihoods Facility in 2006. It means that government departments only have to deal with one donor and it significantly reduces admin costs.

The Multi-Donor Livelihoods Facility is the largest programme of its kind in Cambodia and its support to commune councils has given rise to an extraordinary range of projects and activities which reflect local priorities, and frequently involve the participation of entire communities. Nowhere have the benefi ts of community action been more obvious than in the coastal fishing village of Thmey. When Ham Tun arrived here in the mid-1990s he began fishing for crabs. Soon afterwards, mechanised trawlers invaded the fishing grounds and his yield of crabmeat collapsed from 15 to three kilos a day. He couldn’t make enough money to feed his family and he fell into debt.

But in 2003, the villagers set up a community fishery and excluded the trawlers. Fish and crab stocks recovered and so did Tun’s income. The small shack where he used to live now houses his pigs, and his family has moved into a larger dwelling. “We have enough food and I am no longer in debt,” says Tun.

More Information:

For a fuller account of Cambodia’s resurgence, read: Emerging from the shadows: Improving governance and rural livelihoods in rural Cambodia, by Charlie Pye-Smith. free copies available from DFID, email: dfidincambodia@dfid.gov.uk