The economy continues to be a challenge for many Cambodia’s families. It has been this way for too long a time and it still continues to happen today. Roughly one in every five people lived below the poverty line in 2019 in Cambodia. The annual income of Cambodian families is roughly $1,600 USD.
There are a lot of people in Cambodia including families and college students who have problems with finances. Some families experience extreme poverty, some have problems paying rent and some have to sell their house if they own it to pay for other family bills, including food, and health care. While there is public school, families must pay for books, uniforms, and some public school teachers require kids to pay for extra classes or they threaten to lower kids’ grades. This actually happened to me and my friends. One school year we chose not to pay for an extra after-school class our teacher offered. Because we didn’t pay, he started humiliating us publicly, threatening us, and failing us in his class.
In addition, in Cambodia many families depend on their children to work and help for supplements or income. Some families teach their children to work when they are young. Roughly 7.5% of the kids in Cambodia between the ages of 5 to 14 are working according to research available from the US Department of Labor. But kids who work and who are really young are likely to fall behind in their class.
There are many people and organizations trying to address this problem. Just at the beginning of this year, the Cambodian government raised the minimum wage for regular workers from $200 USD to $204 USD per month. The International Labor Organization (ILO) has a program called the Decent Work Country Programme (DWCP) which works with the Cambodian government to create opportunities including: develop skills for youth and women, and help to make jobs safer.
I think we can do more. One idea is to continue to advocate to increase wages even more. Another idea is to create more safety laws in Cambodia for workers, making sure the buildings are safely constructed and have safety protections like fire escapes and water sprinklers. A third idea is to make sure that Cambodian public schools don’t require kids to pay for extra classes to improve their grades. Make sure that the students feel comfortable so that they can learn and so that they are less likely to drop out.
In conclusion, there are so many ways we can work on the problem of low wages in Cambodia, and I hope we can continue to increase our work on this problem.
Chansomarima Din, 20, was born in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. She is a senior at Lowell High School. She likes to listen to music. Chansomarima wants to work in a hospital.