Sok Toh is a participant of our Strengthening Resettlement and Income Restoration Implementation (SRIRI) project. She was living in one of the affected households that were moved from a rehabilitated railway area in Cambodia. Sok now lives in one of the resettlement communities outside of Phnom Penh and recently began her quest for environmental change in Cambodia.

Previously, the community suffered from a plethora of waste management issues. A majority of these were caused by a lack of knowledge about how to care for the community.

Cufa started working within this community at the end of last year, implementing the Operations and Maintenance (O&M) part of our SRIRI project. This involved waste management campaigns informing people about good hygiene practices and how to correctly dispose of waste, encouraging the use of local landfills. Similarly, waste collection services were implemented and the negative implications of poor waste management were outlined. 

Members of the community are invited to join the O&M committee so that everyone can contribute to making a difference to their local community. In the beginning, Sok did not join as she did not see the benefits. However, after a few months, she came back. She had started seeing that the reduced amount of waste meant less flooding in her house. Once she understood the benefits she became extremely involved, attending O&M training and building a new drain near her house

Flooding around her house has now been severely reduced thanks to a reduction in litter and the upgraded drainage. Sok now spends her spare time collecting plastic bottles around her community. She also sells them to make extra money, maintaining this is just a bonus on top of a clean community.

Sok has become an encouraging figure within the community, inspiring others to work towards environmental change in Cambodia!