Chum Reap Sour!
Your Excellency Professor Mam Bunheng, Minister of Health,
Your Excellency Dr Or Vandine, Secretary of State, Ministry of Health,
Your Excellency Dr Hok Kimcheng, Director General of Health,
Directors and Ministry Staff,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Good afternoon to you all. I am honoured to be part of this important event, the launch of the Cambodia Pharmaceutical Online Registration System.
I would like to start by congratulating the Royal Government of Cambodia and the Ministry of Health on your strong political leadership, the Ministry staff on your dedication and all of you who supported the successful development of this online registration system. In the Western Pacific Region of WHO, only a handful of countries, mostly high-income, have such a computerized registration system.
I am also delighted that I am able to speak at this momentous event as my first official duty as WHO Representative to Cambodia.
I am honoured and excited to begin my work with all of you to realise the Royal Government of Cambodia’s vision for all people in Cambodia to have good health and wellbeing and achieve the Sustainable Development Goal targets, building on the tremendous progress seen in recent decades in this country.
Essential medicines are indispensable for improving the health and saving the lives of people who need them. Regulation is essential to ensure the quality, safety and efficacy of all medical products.
The Department of Drugs and Food at the Ministry of Health, Cambodia has been striving to establish and implement an online registration system for pharmaceutical products with the support of WHO since 2017.
I believe that today’s launch of the online registration system is a giant leap towards the aspirations of the Royal Government of Cambodia towards a "one window" system.
When used effectively, information technology can save money and time, promote efficiency and improve quality of services. However, poorly planned and implemented systems waste money and decrease efficiency.
Ensuring the sustainability and maintenance of the system being launched today is thus a key priority.
WHO will continue to support the Ministry with our contractual agreement with tailored solution for one year starting from the launching of the system today, ensuring a smooth transition from the existing process into a full online registration system.
This is part of our commitment to continue to support improvements to medicines regulation in this country. We will support capacity building, promote regulatory convergence and harmonization, and reinforce the efforts of the Ministry to enhance professional knowledge and skills for regulation.
We are excited to see the piles of papers at the Registration Bureau being replaced with clean tables and computers. I am sure the system will enable regulators and applicants to save time for professional activities.
I wish you all a successful launch and an efficient transition from paper based into a fully automated online registration system.
Thank you.
Orkun Chreoun.