Image:Oxfam.

July 8, 2019
By Chris Hufstader

Chickens and smart farming bring more money to family in Cambodia

"Saren has them, about 150 broilers, and soon they will be for sale. “It’s a good business,” Saren says of her chicken operation, which brought her about $2,000 last year. “It’s making us a good income, so I expect we will expand it some more.”

"Chicken coops encircle a small area behind her house, which is shaded by banana trees and is next to a small reservoir. Business is good; in a year she sells more than 500 birds."

“In just the last three months I have bought a new motorbike [$750], installed new fencing, and constructed a new latrine,” Saren says."

"Like many rice farmers here, Saren relied on just one rice crop. If there was a drought or a flood, it was a catastrophe."

"Another breakthrough for Saren was the System of Rice Intensification (SRI). It helps farmers learn to plant fewer seeds, transplant smaller, individual seedlings farther apart (instead of many seedlings in a large clump), and grow larger, stronger, and more productive rice plants. “I said to others at the training that I did not believe it,” Saren says, laughing now at how skeptical she was."

"Saren went from being a subsistence rice farmer to someone with a surplus, making money selling 50 percent of her production."

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