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Oxfam Volunteers Presentation

On Wednesday 9 May, Oxfam volunteers Penny and Andy Hemsted, who have recently returned from a tour of Oxfam projects in Cambodia, will be speaking about their experiences.

The talk and presentation will take place at 3pm in the Oxfam shop on central campus.

Austin Lloyd, manager of the Oxfam shop at Warwick said:
"Oxfam's work has always been about more than just short term relief, however important that is. Oxfam is committed to working towards overcoming poverty and suffering in the long term. Sometimes, that means building up livestock, such as the goat from our award winning gift catalogue, sometimes it means investing in educating children, and sometimes it means empowering local people by teaching them about their rights, or by building local civil society networks capable of continuing our work once we are gone.

"Penny and Andy's presentation is a wonderful chance to learn more about how the profit from your local shop is spent, deftly demonstrating our relief, development and empowerment work."

Talking about her experiences, Penny continued by saying "We met several people who had received a cow to use for breeding, compost for organic farming and to supplement their rice based diet. Others now own fishing nets and a boat which provide them with a sustainable livelihood as well as a means of escape to safety when the annual floods occur.

"We learned, also, that Oxfam’s work in Cambodia is not primarily about giving material goods and resources direct but is more about empowering people at grassroots level to make changes for themselves. It is about educating them in law and their rights and sharing practices that are working well elsewhere, to enable them to make changes in the structure and circumstances of their own lives. It is also about building confidence in individuals so that they can challenge the norm and create networks of people with similar concerns to demonstrate they are not alone and that, by working together, they can change their society for the better so that the whole community can benefit."

For more information about Oxfam's work in Cambodia visit: http://www.oxfam.org.uk/what_we_do/where_we_work/cambodia/index.htm