Post COVID 19, Cambodia’s transport and public works redirect toward sustainability

• 7 June 2020
• Local News
• 2469 Views

Cambodia economy has felt great impact from the corona-virus outbreak. In the same tone with the world bank’s prediction of the minus 1% to 2.9% economic drop, the UN spell out similar tone that like many countries around the world, Cambodia faces a complex challenge to respond to the impact of Covid-19.

This is according to the UN Resident Coordinator Pauline Tamesis said in a meeting of the inter-ministerial committee to combat Covid-19 with the UN country team on April 30.

She added “Even though there has not been a major outbreak of the disease in Cambodia, the external economic fallout is already affecting the national economy. This challenge is not only in health but also in other areas such as education, tourism, trade, finance, and industries.”

“Leading sectors such as textiles, tourism and construction are under severe pressure, resulting in lower output and mass layoffs, and there will be knock-on effects on other sectors too.”

To what extend the pandemic affects the construction project is not yet measurable. However, to help Cambodia economy out of the crisis, different international donors have been already preparing their post – COVID 19 projects though with different priority, but in the similar goal.

So far, two international funding projects are seen as trying to redirect the Cambodian economy toward this sustainable development goal. One is a new UN project under the UNCTAD initiative which focuses on trade and transport challenges and the other one is the funding from UNDP in combination with Sweden government and the EU prioritizing the construction, energy and transportation sectors.

The new UNCTAD seeks to construct transport and trade networks in Cambodia and other developing countries around the world to deal with trade and transport challenges in the post COVID-19 period. Although the exact funding is not available to the public yet, but it is stated clearly that it is administered by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs and will be concentrating on helping governments and businesses keep transport networks and borders operational and facilitate the flow of goods and services while containing the spread of the corona-virus.

“The project, launched this month, will implement UN solutions, standards, guidelines, metrics, tools and methodologies to help developing countries build transport, trade and logistics resilience in the wake of Covid-19,” Read a UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) press release.

At the same time, in late April Cambodian government have just received another funding worth US$3.34 million the Government of Sweden and the UNDP’s funding under the Cambodia Climate Change Alliance Phase III (CCCA – 3) program to implement its project from 2020 to 2022.

In this CCCA Third Phase, the Swedish government budget, EUR 6 million from the European Union and the other half million (US$ 0.5) contributed form UNDP; this US$3.34 million aids will be spending on five key sectors: energy, public works and transport, rural development, environment, and education, in reference to the current UNDP press.

With these amounts of funding, the two UN bodies expect the future economic recover-ability of the country differently.

“Cambodia is exposed as a highly open economy for trade, but also one with a narrow economic base with few fallback options,” said Tamesis of the UN Resident Coordinator.

Whereas Nick Beresford, UNDP Resident Representative for Cambodia, views that:

“…We can find opportunities in crisis to further climate proof Government investments and stimulate green and resilient private investments….As around the world we all face the full onslaught of the corona-virus pandemic we need to make sure our investments help create a cleaner, safer world for all our citizens.”