Background
Almost 500 000 workers are employed in Cambodia’s garment industry. The majority of them are women of reproductive age who have migrated from rural provinces to the capital, Phnom Penh. Although Cambodia’s high maternal and child mortality rates have decreased dramatically in the last few years, garment workers still remain a vulnerable group due to lack of health insurance, limited knowledge of where to access safe abortion services and inflexible work schedules, making it difficult for them to visit health clinics during opening hours. Because of this, garment workers are often led to use unsafe and expensive health care services and have a higher abortion rate compared to other women of reproductive age.

About the project
This project was created to improve sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) services for garment workers in nine factories in Phnom Penh, by boosting the capacity of midwives on family planning counselling and improving garment workers’ access to four different health centres located close to the factories. Midwives from the health centres were trained by the project team on counselling related to contraceptive use. In addition to this, peer educators from the garment factories were trained to share information about SRHR and available services to their fellow workers.

Results
By the end of this project, three out of four health centres had increased the number of garment workers visiting them each month to access contraceptives. The health centres changed their opening hours in order for the workers to be able to visit them during the weekends and the midwives used their improved skills and confidence to meet the needs of the patients. The project team also shared information and challenges related to garment workers’ access to SRHR services with the Phnom Penh Municipality Health Department and other stakeholders, who will continue with the project, to ensure garment workers’ access to friendly and high quality health services going forward.

Year: 2015