The ‘Time to Act’ project, designed to address the issue of early marriages, is the first in Ratanakkiri and Stung Treng. PIC
Plan International Cambodia (PIC) and the Ministry of Women’s Affairs held a workshop on March 27 to announce the “Time to Act” project, designed to address the issue of early marriages.
Time to Act is the first project based in Ratanakkiri and Stung Treng provinces that promotes support for adolescent girls and boys in the northeast region of Cambodia who are under pressure to enter into child marriages, early marriages, forced marriages or other similar unions – referred to by activists on this issue by the acronym CEFMU.
The project will seek to end all instances of CEFMU and also to help the potential victims successfully transition to adulthood, according to the press release.
Ministry secretary of state Hou Samith said at the seminar that the promotion of children’s rights and the protection of children require the total prevention of CEFMU from taking place in the Kingdom.
“The project will reach out to adolescent girls who are at risk of early childhood marriage, forced marriages or relationships that will force them to drop out of school.
Instead, they can graduate and continue on to lower secondary school and high schools in the short term. It provides them with opportunities, economic support and assistance with entrepreneurship, as well as being able to fully implement their rights to protection.
“Once they have opportunities, options, independence and empowerment, adolescent girls can exercise their rights to protection from sexual abuse and gender-based violence and become active participants in the prevention measures enacted by their community,” said Samith.
The organisation estimates that this project will help approximately 6,000 adolescent girls and boys in Ratanakkiri and Stung Treng who would otherwise be at high risk for CEFMU or other associated problems.
According to a press release seen by The Post on March 27, the project, funded by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and Plan International (Germany), has been underway for three years from January 1 of this year to December 31, 2025.
“Time to Act project works closely in partnership with two local NGOs: Wathnakpheap and Khmer Youth Association in 16 target communes,” it said.
PIC country director Gwynneth Wong noted in the press release that school dropouts remains a concerning impediment to the development of Cambodia as it impedes progress and prosperity for adolescent girls.
She said girls, especially in rural areas, face risks not only to their physical health via child pregnancy, but also through domestic and gender-based violence, with increased challenges to economic empowerment.
According to PIC’s country strategy baseline study issued in October 2020, the CEFMU rate in Ratanakkiri stood at 48 per cent when counting marriages involving those under 18 years of age, and at 25 per cent for those under 18 in Stung Treng province.
Lek Kary, the daughter of a family belonging to the Kreung ethnic group in Ratanakkiri province who successfully managed to overcome the tradition of early marriage for herself, said that ending CEFMU is necessary and needs the support of all stakeholders.
Kary also expressed her happiness about the new project and the support it will give to adolescent girls and boys in the northeast region.
“As a goodwill ambassador for PIC on this issue, I am responsible for promoting and encouraging all adolescent girls facing this problem to be brave. Marriage at a young age is a long-standing tradition, but now times must change,” she said.
