THE US Embassy, in cooperation with Club of Cambodian Journalists (CCJ), started a three-day training course on Monday titled "Economic and Environmental Reporting".

The course is designed to improve the capacity of working journalists in Cambodia.

Twenty journalists from both the print and broadcast media were trained in the three-day course which ran from Monday to Wednesday at the CCJ office.

The course is being conducted by experienced American lecturer Rusty Todd, director of business journalism at the University of Hong Kong and professor at the University of Texas School of Journalism.

Pen Samithy, CCJ president, said the course was a great opportunity for the Cambodian journalists to gain more experience and knowledge from Todd, who has extensive experience and skill in his field of business journalism.

Pen Samithy said he hoped the training course would encourage the Cambodian journalists to report more on economic and environmental issues, in an effort to preserve the country's environment and develop its economy.

The training course is fully supported by the US embassy in Cambodia.

"The US Embassy is pleased to once again be able to work with CCJ in an effort to build capacity amongst this country's journalists," said US embassy spokesman John Johnson.

Johnson said improvements in the journalists' skills would assist them in reporting on issues which were important to the Cambodia's economic development.

The US Embassy also makes a financial contribution to a one-year computer training project run by the CCJ.

The computer course is making an effort to help the Cambodian journalists to benefit from better understanding information and communication technologies.