history

The core program of CDMD, Community Based Rehabilitation, has a long history with many years of experience and expertise devoted to its realisation.

In 1993 the program started under the name Rehabilitation for Blind Cambodians - Community Based Rehabilitation (RBC- CBR). At that time it was part of the international NGO called Maryknoll. 

In the year 2000 the program RBC- CBR was handed over to Caritas, another international NGO, and Daughters of Charity based in Thailand administered the program. 

Eventually in 2007 the local staff felt the urge to become independent and create a new sense of ownership. With the support and recommendation of Caritas, the project was localised and a new independent, registered and local non-governmental aid organisation called ‘Cambodian Development Mission for Disability’ – CDMD - was established.

good governance, participation and democracy

The Board of Directors was formed before the establishment of CDMD itself. The members are well established and all have a long-standing background in various sectors from education, ministries and businesses. Together they ensure transparency, accountability and the credibility of the CDMD’s organisation. Similarly, the board is accountable to donors and the Royal Government of Cambodia. 

“As a board of directors we have been committed to supporting CDMD, ensuring good governance, participation and democracy. Even though our passionate involvement, we’ll remain critical - always keeping in mind the need to be part of a society against corruption.” - Kho Huoth, Chairperson Board of Directors

Running the organisation on a day-to-day basis is done by the Management Committee consisting of four members: Executive Director, Finance/Admin Coordinator, CBR Coordinator, Technical & Government Liaison Coordinator, and Communication/Advocacy Coordinator. All members play an important role in ensuring good governance, transparency, coordination and decision making.

With 11 Community Supervisors and two CBR Managers, CDMD works in its target areas. These field staffs play an important role in CBR. They work closely at grass-roots level with clients and their families, the communities and all relevant service providers.

 

Community volunteers

Currently, CDMD is in the process of changing its approach - making communities themselves more responsible for all their community members and disability issues. Therefore it has started to work with community volunteers, who are currently trained by the field staff.

“I am proud to see the achievements of CDMD so far, its efforts to mobilise support at community level through community volunteers and its continued promotion of co-operation with local authorities at community and district level.” - Kho Huoth, Chairperson Board of Directors.

 

As a team we are committed to empower people with disability. The number of working years at our program range between two and 17 years, most of us have been working for more than five years. And some of the coordinators and supervisors were once fieldworkers themselves. Hence they understand the grass root level issues on the field.

In case you want a complete overview of our organisation, visit our Report Archives. Here you’ll find our latest organisation chart.