US Provides Additional Flood Relief to Cambodia

Posted November 1st, 2011 at 8:40 pm (UTC-5)
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The United States is providing nearly $1.5 million to Cambodia to address critical needs in drinking water, sanitation, agriculture and livelihoods in flood-ravaged areas.

The U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh issued a statement Tuesday saying the aid will be supplied through the U.S. Agency for International Development's Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance.

The money will go to relief organizations working in Cambodia, Save the Children and World Vision.

The embassy statement says the two organizations will reach close to 60,000 of the most vulnerable people in the next six months.

Save the Children already received $50,000 from the U.S. government last month. It will get an additional grant of $750,000.

The relief aid will go to three of the most-affected provinces – – Kampong Cham, Kampong Thom, and Kandal.

Since July heavy rains have caused floods across southeast Asia with Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam being the most affected. USAID says more than 800 people in he region have been killed and about 10 million others have been affected by floods.

The Phnom Penh Post newspaper reported Tuesday that the Danish government has doubled its assistance to flood victims in rural Cambodia with a $60,000 grant to rural development agency Life With Dignity. The grant is intended to help about 7,000 people in Kampong province. Floods have destroyed about 60 percent of the rice crop in the central Cambodian province.