Sweeping the City

In a survey last year of what people thought of government ministries and services, the group that got the greatest approval was the sanitation department which outranked the police, the military, the judicial system, and all the rest.

Garbage collection in Phnom Penh has been privatized, taken over by a company called Cintri, and they do a remarkable job. It's tempting to say they are the only part of officialdom here that works. All their employees are dressed in distinctive green coats, the same color as their trucks and carts, and they are everywhere! And they do the job! They don't have anything but crude brooms, but they bend over to scrape up the rubbish piles with pieces of cardboard, they work in the midst of traffic flying past them--and they clean the city!

It's good to have at least one example in the country of an institution that does what it's supposed to and responds to the needs of the people.


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