Altogether more than 40 participants from different organizations, NGOs, INGOs, CBOs, Communities and network were the participants of CACHA (CACHA is the national Chapter of APACHA in Cambodia) National Consultative Meeting held in Phnomphen. Asia Coordinator of APACHA, Prabodh Devkota was also one of the participants of the meeting. Consultative meeting was held in the premises of Women's Agenda for Change.

Participants discussed about their achievements in strengthening CACHA over the period and expressed their happiness that they have been able to maintain visibility across. One of the most important realizations that the participants expressed was the space for real advocacy campaign. They were of the opinion that CACHA is creating space for advocacy and communities have now started to feel that it is their space to raise their voices.

Food security and HIV campaign of CACHA was one of the major discussions during the meeting and the members found campaign being successful in bringing important community concerns at the policy level. They also shared that UNAIDS report has also acknowledged CACHA campaign on food and HIV. They agreed that this has been a pioneer action around Universal Access in Cambodia.

Members then reflected on the real community based issues that people are facing and they also highlighted their ongoing initiatives to address these challenges. One of the important issues that strongly came across was the stigma and discrimination. Some of the members focused on the practical challenges that are blocking PLHIV in accessing care and treatment services. The issues of children's were also discussed and members have identified this as one of the serious concerns for CACHA.

All participants highlighted that CACHA has been able to create a creative space for people to raise their real concern and it is promoting freedom of expression. They were of the opinion that CACHA encourages PLHA and other community people to raise their concerns and enjoy their freedom of expressions.

They also discussed that gradually government agencies at the central and provincial levels, UN agencies, donors, I/NGOs and other actors have also started to acknowledge the strengths of CACHA. Participants also discussed about areas of further improvement of CACHA. They also expressed their view that their campaign on Universal Access was a good beginning to make a difference and also in bringing a new perspective to look at the epidemic.

Asia regional coordinator of APACHA, discussed about how APACHA is growing in many countries such as Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka and how APACHA is connecting to other countries such as Laos, Indonesia, and Vietnam. He also discussed about the issues around HIV&AIDS and broader development challenges. He emphasized that multisectoral approach has been a cliché these days and it is limited in conducting some workshops. Thus APACHA is practicing multisectoral approach in its real term by engaging different stakeholders and mobilizing communities.

Participants discussed about the crosscutting issues such as HIV&AIDS and food security, HIV and development, HIV and women, HIV and Children, HIV and trade Unions etc. This session was focused to discuss on why it is now important for CACHA to engage with other agencies which are yet to respond the issue seriously.

In the discussion it clearly came out that APACHA and its allies are growing as one of the largest mass based regional network in Asia and it is also creating political space for wider social movements in Asia.

CACHA members also discussed on the structure of CACHA and they came to the point that CACHA has gone a long way and now it is important for CACHA to take more organized actions at different levels. To facilitate and coordinate the over all processes, they need strong institutional base, effective coordination and communication mechanism. To address some of the immediate issues, meeting decided to take some immediate actions. Similarly, in the context of Cambodia the national consultative meeting has decided to take some more organized actions and campaigns. Some of the core areas of upcoming initiatives are:

• Universal Access will be the core focus of the Interim plan
• Governance and Accountability
• Food and HIV will be the core area of campaign
• Stigma and discriminations
• Women's leadership
• Capacity building
• Multi-sectoral mobilization
• Days celebration (WAD, Candlelight memorial, GAWA, Women, Labor etc.)
• Publication of news letter