CAT’s Monitoring Trip
16-18 March, 2004 Nikum Loeu, Tbong Khmom District, Kampong Chham

Ms. Thida Khus, SILAKA’s Executive Director, went to monitor the class activities of the Cambodian Advocacy Training Project (CAT) on 16-18 March, 2004. The class is the first class of CAT project, funded by the Catholic Institute of International Relation which supported the South-East Asia Committee for Advocacy, SEACA.

The training in Tbong Khmom District, Kampong Chham is the first training for 25 community practitioners coming from 5 communities. The training took place from 15-18 March and will cover the Media and Communication and PRA. The training has been facilitated by of Star Kampuchea (Ms. Nou Bunnary), from SILAKA (Mr. Chola Kus, Mr. Um Phanna, and Mr. Heng Vannarith) and Urban Program for Women and Development (Ms. Kou Sina). The training took place on the community center of the Nikum Loeu community organization. The practice of communication and research skills was implemented in Nikum Krom, of the Tbong Khmom district. At the end of the class they made plan for implementation in their local communities.

CAT is a project, administered by SILAKA, with the goal to localize specific grassroots advocacy skills in Cambodian context. The project aims at adapting the training curriculums on 3 subject areas: Communication and Media, Participatory Research Action (PRA), and Advocacy Skills. SEACA’s partners have trained a total of 12 staff from 10 Cambodian partners’ organizations on the 3 topics in Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippine. The Cambodian participants have adapted the curriculum to local needs and tested it with local communities.

SEACA is a regional organization with partners in Cambodia, Burma, Lester Timor, Philippine, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam. SEACA has been supported by CIIR in Great Britain. SEACA aims at building national NGOs partners’ capacity on advocacy, with the purpose to enable them to work on policies and measures to reduce poverties in the 8 countries.

Participants and trainers will conduct field practice in 5 communities on research activities after the first training. The second training will focus on advocacy strategy, followed by advocacy activities selected by participants and the focus communities. It will take place on April & May, 2004.

For more information on CAT program, please see the program description. For information on SEACA, please log on: (http://www.seaca.net).