Phnom Penh, Cambodia; Khammouane Province, Laos — November 2007— International Relief & Development's Board Vice President Patricia Tyson and Director Roland Johnson recently returned from their two-week tour of IRD's activities in Southeast Asia. The Directors had the opportunity to see several of IRD's extensive child health programs first-hand.

Tyson and Johnson traveled to Cambodia to visit IRD's Better Foods for Better Lives program, promoting both agricultural and private-sector development in Cambodia while having the added benefit of improving the nutritional status of low-income households and school children. Country Director J.A. ‘Sandy’ Sempliner hosted the D.C. delegation as they toured the USDA-funded program. The delegation had the opportunity to meet with Dr. Nout Sokhom, the Cambodian Minister of Health who signed the Memorandum of Understanding allowing IRD to begin work in Cambodia.

“IRD's contribution, both financial and physical, is helpful and crucial," said Dr. Sokhom. "We appreciate your activity at the community level.”

The Better Foods for Better Lives program has created 50 new full-time jobs; has given 110 female noodle factory workers full-time jobs, an increase in noodle factory production; and impressively, has increased local wheat milling capacity by 31percent, with Cambodia’s largest mill now producing fortified wheat flour for the first time in the country's history.

While in Cambodia, Directors Johnson and Tyson also toured IRD's Reducing Under-Five Morbidity and Mortality through Good Nutrition and Clean Water program activities, based in the Teuk Phos district of Kampong Chhnang Province. This health and hygeine project targets over 54,000 people in 81 villages and eight communes, with 6,000 beneficiaries being children under the age of five and 23,500 women of reproductive age. The delegation visited a rural school where nutrition counseling and hygiene were demonstrated by using puppet shows which covered basic health tenants, proven hygiene practices, the importance of clean drinking water, and nutrition – courtesy of Latter Day Saints Charities. 

The Directors' also visited Khammouane Province, Laos, with a tour of five of the one hundred and ten schools located in the Gnomalat, Boualapa and Mahasay Districts participating in IRD’s Safe Educational Opportunities Project. The project aims to improve the educational opportunities and nutritional status of primary school students, especially girls, by serving nutritious mid-morning snacks and providing take-home rations. The program also renovates schools, digs wells, builds latrines, clears school yards of unexploded mines to develop school gardens, provides teacher training, and strengthens Parent-Teacher Associations - all to promote school attendance in these districts. Operated in joint partnership with the Humpty Dumpty Institute and the Mine Advisory Group, the project has also received 660 metric tons of food from the United States Department of Agriculture - rice, red beans, corn-soy blend and canned salmon – to support its activities.

“It was impressive to note the caliber of leadership and activism among the PTAs and village leaders,” Tyson said.  “And I’m pleased that the gardens will help supplement the children’s diets by introducing green, leafy vegetables in addition to the CSB snacks.”