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| Urban gardening uses a small amount of space to create a lot of value! |
Now that October has arrived, Khom Loy's projects in Mae Sot have been at full capacity and more! Some items on the list include: continuing current school garden programs, starting a round of new garden schools, improving the capacity of our pig projects and beginning a new ambitious program of surveying communities on the Burmese side of the border.
School Garden Programs
After a volatile and unpredictable rainy season, we will be continuing work at Hsa Mu Htaw and Holy Infant Orphanage schools, to ensure that some final touches are implemented to keep the schools going strong into the future. In addition, we will be helping Heavenly Home school transition to become an independent project during their second round of growing.
Semester break for Burmese migrant schools in Mae Sot takes place in late October. This gives us a great opportunity to launch our new round of garden schools, including Parami and Love & Care. A third school, Min Ma Haw, will begin work in December, and a final school to be determined will begin work in January. Keep an eye open for updates on any and all of these schools in the near future!
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| An overhead trellis for vine vegetables at Hsa Mu Htaw school |
Pig Project/Integrated Farming Projects
Now working with two schools (Hway Ka Loke and Thoo Mwe Khee), the pig project is picking up steam. In addition to completing a "How-To" process manual in both English and Burmese, we have also been able to access valuable research from Mae Jo University, a major actor in researching and implementing pig projects that use fermented banana stalk (FBS) as a low-cost feed input. With this added knowledge, we have an improved feed system for our pigs.
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| New round of mixed-breed pigs at Hway Ka Loke school |
Surveying Communities in Burma (Myanmar)
Given the ongoing political and developmental changes in Burma, we are looking into border areas that would serve as focal points for expanding the spread of agricultural techniques and knowledge, and where larger development programs may not be able to reach right away.
That's why we've started a survey program to learn more about Burmese and Karen communities bordering Tak province, Thailand. We have a goal of building relationships with at least 20 of these communities by the end of December.
So if you're interested in learning more about things like vertical gardening, low-cost agriculture and a country that is slowly opening itself up to the world, then this journal is the place for you. Also, feel free to be a part of KLDF's projects by clicking "Make A Donation" at the top right corner of the page. Thanks in advance!
