Try Thy, a hard-working project manager
Try Thy, 40, has many plans for his country, Cambodia. Executive Director of Open Development Cambodia (ODC) since 2013, he is now the national coordinator in Cambodia for the Media for One health project, a “groundbreaking concept in Cambodia".
He dreamed of becoming a doctor. From this unfulfilled dream, Try Thy, 40, from the province of Kampong Cham in central Cambodia, retains an uncompromising determination to help others.
"Try is a machine. I don't know when he sleeps. He is completely devoted to his work", explains Pyrou Chung, 46, Director of the Open Development Initiative, an open information and data network set up by the East-West Management Institute in the Lower Mekong basin (Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Thailand and Myanmar) to boost the development of these countries. Since 2013, Try has worked as the Executive Director of Open Development Cambodia, an organisation set up in 2011 and based in Phnom Pen, the capital of Cambodia. A very active online platform gives the general public access to current, historical, journalistic and research-based data on the country's socio-economic development, in a completely transparent manner.
A law graduate from the Royal University of Law and Economics in Phnom Penh, Try was won over by CFI’s Media for One health project, which aims to improve the knowledge of health issues by disseminating more reliable information to raise awareness. "As a national coordinator, I put the key partners in touch with each other. The “One Health”* approach is very innovative for the Cambodian people and journalists, and is one of the main priorities for Cambodia", confirms Try.
International recognition
Try Thy has twice been selected to take part in the Paris Peace Forum, in 2019 and 2022. "Try has extraordinary leadership skills. He has a clear vision of our goals and the means to achieve them. He's great at facilitating relationships," says Pyrou Chung.
This year, Try also attended the World Biodiversity Forum in Davos, Switzerland. "As part of the Data4Nature Initiative, Try presented a project for free, open access to biodiversity data from environmental impact assessments. Try is always smiling and is passionate about his work ", explains Andrew Rodrigues, data partnership officer for the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), based in Copenhagen.
Clearly devoted, Try never forgets his own people and has also made a name for himself by launching the Prayuters Library in September 2023 in the province where he grew up, Preah Vihear, to give people living in rural areas access to books and digital technology. In the same spirit of sharing information with as many people as possible, Try hopes that by the end of the CFI project "trained journalists will be able to produce more health-related articles using open access data".
Portrait by Bérengère Merlot (Journalistes Médiateurs)
*The "One Health" approach invites us to think differently about health, recognising the interdependence of the wellbeing of humans, animals and the ecosystems they share on our one planet. It uses the close and interdependent links between these three facets to develop new methods for monitoring and preventing disease (source: World Health Organization).