Dear Friends,
My name is Priscilla Ngero. I am honored to have been given the opportunity to cover for Solinn during her maternity leave. I will be working together with our program teams and our partners until the end of March 2020 as Interim Country Director for Oxfam in Cambodia. It is a great pleasure for me to join this very energetic team and to be able to share my perspective with our Pineeh Pinooh readers!
This issue will focus on responsible and inclusive business, so allow me to share Oxfam in Cambodia’s work on this.
In 2015, Oxfam started a regional project called “Gender Transformative and Responsible Agribusiness Investments in South-East Asia (GRAISEA)” to promote win-win inclusive business models that benefit smallholder farmers, local companies and foreign companies in international markets, with a focus on women’s leadership and empowerment. As part of GRAISEA, Oxfam and some like-minded companies and civil society organizations (CSOs) initiated the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Platform Cambodia, mobilizing more than 40 companies, chambers of commerce and CSOs. The objective was 1) to share their best practices and resources, and 2) to influence and promote responsible and inclusive business practices that benefit Cambodian women and men.
A great example of inclusive business is our member and partner, Amru Rice, which bases its business model on working with farmers as valued partners through contract farming and on supporting them to develop their entrepreneurial spirit and skills and become “agri-preneurs.” Amru Rice is also a key partner in various BlocRice and RiceTechCambodia projects that aim to promote smallholder producer inclusion, women economic empowerment and climate change resilience. More Cambodian companies are embracing inclusiveness by working directly with groups of farmers and smallholder producers, while taking to heart the well-being of their employees. One of those is the Khmer Organic Cooperative whose founder is sharing his perspective in this issue.
There is true potential for partnerships with private companies to yield sustainable benefits for smallholder producers in the market. Oxfam and its partners are ready and excited to be part of the conversation to promote a truly responsible and inclusive business environment in Cambodia that benefits all, especially women and the most vulnerable.
We would love to hear your feedback for an inclusive Pineeh Pinooh. Please send us comments and opinion pieces to PineehPinooh.Cambodia@oxfam.org.
I hope you enjoy reading the fourth issue of Pineeh Pinooh!
Best wishes,
Priscilla