Charity Overview

Empowering Cambodia is a grassroots organisation committed to lifting disadvantaged families out of poverty by creating sustainable community-based solutions. Their work focuses on providing poor households with the tools, training, and opportunities to build livelihoods that can support long-term stability.

In 2019, Empowering Cambodia launched a pioneering initiative - a Chicken, Duck, and Fish Cooperative Project - aimed at families who had little to no land for rice farming or cattle raising. These families were often left with no way to earn reliable income, trapping them in cycles of poverty and uncertainty.

The Challenge

In rural Cambodia, many families lack access to fertile land or livestock, leaving them with no means of subsistence farming or income generation. Without these foundations, parents face impossible choices: children are withdrawn from school to contribute to survival, families fall into debt, and communities remain trapped in cycles of scarcity.

For families already living on the margins, even small economic shocks - illness, job loss, natural disasters - can push them into crisis. What they need is not just charity, but sustainable ways to generate income and build resilience for the future.

Meridian’s Support

• Year Awarded: 2019
• Grant Amount: $15,000

Meridian’s grant enabled Empowering Cambodia to expand their new income generation cooperative, supporting poor households in central Cambodia to raise poultry and fish as viable businesses. The program provided:

• Training in small-scale farming techniques for chickens, ducks, and fish.
• Access to cooperative resources and community support.
• A pathway to generate income through selling produce in local markets.

By backing the cooperative, Meridian helped transform subsistence survival into entrepreneurial opportunity.

The Impact

• 50 households actively participated in the program.
• 317 community members directly and indirectly benefited.
• Families who had previously struggled daily to provide food now generated stable income from raising poultry and fish.

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Impact Stories:

• One family reported moving from a “hopeless, stressful situation” to newfound stability: with daily work raising poultry, they now earn an income, plan for their needs, and have the dignity of self-reliance.
• Another participant began with just 13 hens and 60 chicks. Within months, they were growing a thriving small business and spoke of confidence that their income - and lifestyle - would continue to improve.

These personal stories highlight the essence of the program: small beginnings that grow into sustainable change.

Looking Forward

The cooperative model continues to inspire resilience in rural Cambodia. Families who once faced chronic insecurity are now business owners, equipped with skills and assets that will sustain them into the future. The success of this project also provides a replicable framework for other communities across Cambodia, showing that scalable, low-cost solutions can break entrenched cycles of poverty.

For Meridian, this case study illustrates how a relatively modest grant can become a catalyst for long-term transformation - creating ripples of impact that extend far beyond the initial investment.

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