Flood Update

Flooding in Central Thailand (picture from CNNGo.com)

Thailand has been in the news recently as some of the strongest flooding in the past 40 years has been occurring.

While our work area in Mae Sot has not been hit directly, there are some concerning factors to consider for the near future, especially for migrant schools on the Thai/Burmese border:

• With such a large area of agricultural production marred by the flooding, food prices have begun to rise sharply.  This includes rice, vegetables, meat, and other staple foods.  Migrant schools already struggling to find funding for school meals will find it considerably more difficult over the next year.
• Agricultural inputs like animal feed and garden supplies will also increase in price.
• Migrants who work at factories in Central Thailand and Bangkok have been returning to Burma via Mae Sot over the past week.  Some of these workers have family in Mae Sot and decide to stay, which could increase the # of students and overall migrants in the area.

Thailand has been struck by large-scale flooding for two years straight now.  If this trend is to continue, UPLift's goal of assisting migrant schools to become more self-reliant for food and funding is becoming a priority.

We have plans to work with schools on eight new garden projects and additional animal rearing projects over the next year.  It is our hope that these students, teachers and schools benefit by having a more stable environment for food production; ultimately, children having sound educations and full bellies is well worth it.

Women's Entrepreneurship Program Set to Begin

We are very happy to announce that the UPLift Project is now beginning its program to set up small businesses with female entrepreneurs living in poverty.

As mentioned on previous posts, Khom Loy teamed up with Room To Grow Foundation to compete in "Project Inspire", a contest set up by UN Women (Singapore) and Mastercard to address women's empowerment and entrepreneurship.  As a result of our efforts we received a US$10,000 grant to begin a Financial Literacy program with impoverished women living in a landfill community on the Thai/Burmese border!

Since having planned for a project to cost US$25,000 and last two years did not match with our grant, we have spent the time after the contest to improve and adjust our project in order to provide maximum benefit to women in need at a lower cost, while still maintaining all of our original objectives.

The old project idea involved opening a Women's Resource Center near the landfill where women could generate daily income while receiving financial literacy and life skills trainings.  Through these trainings, UPLift would then  choose ten high motivated and inspiring women, and help each set up a small social enterprise that could provide them with increased income while simultaneously addressing social needs on the landfill.  In addition, we added the goal of having 15 young girls having the financial freedom to attend a nearby migrant school.

The new project idea, while not including land and a center, has much more flexibility, includes double the number of beneficiaries and leaves Mae Sot with a large number of young and capable trainers that can share financial literacy skills with impoverished women in their future communities and jobs.

We will begin by training 24 young adults at a nearby project management school named Wide Horizons on how to become financial literacy trainers themselves.  These individuals are already receiving the education and skills needed to successfully run programs with Burmese and ethnic minority communities, and their capacity to do so will improve after learning more about financial literacy.

Our new project plan spreads knowledge and capacity to a much wider audience!

Our 24 trainers will then work not only with the landfill community, but also a nearby migrant community that they are already working with.  This doubles the # of women receiving these financial literacy skills, and gives UPLift a larger pool of motivated and creative women to work with on small social entrepreneurships.  Finally, the 24 trainers, upon  finishing their work at Wide Horizons, then return to their respective development organizations in Thailand and Burma, where they will have the capacity to design similar programs intended to empower women and improve knowledge.

We are very motivated to begin, and will keep you updated as the project unfolds. Wait until you see the results!

Project Update--The Pigs Are Waiting

Dirty work underway at Hway Ka Loke school, Mae Sot

The past month has been full of learning curves for the UPLift Pig/Compost project--preparing for a pig rearing project that uses low-cost inputs like fermented banana stalk feed and powerful microorganisms harvested locally, we have been fighting through rainy season to get everything ready for the pigs to arrive in October.  See what we've been doing below, and for the full photo update click here!

Students lending a hand...well, their feet, by crushing eggshells for use in a calcium concentrate

Our completed work area, with pig pen sticking out amongst the banana trees

Harvesting bananas for students, and trimming down the cluster of stalks

One teacher has been doing a great job of keeping rosella and young banana trees healthy during the rains

Speaking of rain, it has been the heaviest season in the past few decades, which can be seen by looking at our original deep litter above.

...however, we have been refilling the deep litter with soil, sacrificing some volume for a dry and effective space for the pigs

Students and staff help to prep a fermented concentrate that provides large amounts of nitrogen for pigs and vegetables alike

Pig Project Update--IMO Workshop

Ingredients for Fermented Fruit Juice, or FPJ

The UPLift Pig/Compost project pilot is still going strong in Mae Sot, Thailand  The system of raising pigs on a mixture of banana stalk, dry feed and homemade microorganism concentrates is moving on to its second phase--teaching both teachers and students at Hway Ka Loke Migrant School how to make "IMOs", or indigenous microorganisms.

These microorganisms are to be used in several ways:

• to enhance the feed of the pigs by providing stronger and more appropriate bacteria to the stomachs of the pigs
• to break down the banana feed mix into simple nutrients, so that pigs can digest more nutrients than when eating store feed
• to break down existing deep-litter materials into organic matter and compost, so that the school can use or sell up to a ton of rich compost per year

Our staff began the workshop last week by introducing a few basic processes for making these IMOs, of which there are seven in total for use in the project.  Take a look!

Students and teachers prepared ingredients for an IMO that promotes stomach health (for pigs as well as humans!)

Morning glory and sugar will be fermented to create a liquid used to water pigs, as well as increase nitrogen and potassium levels in the school's vegetable patches

Finished IMOs in the fermentation process

UPLift Project Wins Grant from Project Inspire

UPLift is happy to announce that we have won a USD$10,000 Financial Literacy grant from UN Women and Mastercard! Last week was spent in Singapore making our pitch for an innovative and inspired idea to work with disadvantaged women from the Mae Sot landfill community.

 

 

Our project will combine an effective training course, an income generation activity and a social enterprise program so that women can begin small business that address social needs on the landfill reward women for their motivation and creativity.

 

 

Special thanks to both UN Women and Mastercard for holding the event, and giving us the chance to make a lasting impact in the lives of women that currently make less than $2 a day. Updates will continue!

Another belated thanks to all of the other participants--coming from places like the Philippines, Indonesia, and Ghana, these young and motivated people inspired us and showed us that there great and effective ideas for empowering women. Congratulations to all!

Competing at Project Inspire

This week we are competing at the Project Inspire finals in Singapore! Organized by UN Women and Mastercard, Project Inspire gives a US$25,000 award to the team with the best plan for empowering women. For more information, visit the Project Inspire website here.

 

 

Mark is travelling to Singapore to present on Wednesday to represent our team, which includes both Khom Loy Foundation and Room 2 Grow Foundation from Mae Sot, Thailand. Updates to follow this week.

Good Advice

A big thanks to Ajan Boonsong for stopping by our pilot project at Hway Ka Loke learning center in Tak province to check in and give some words of advice for the ongoing construction of our pig pen there!

Ajan Boonsong is the manager of a sustainable farm test site for Partners' Relief and Development, an organization that has actively worked with Khom Loy over the past few years in the fields of education and training on the Thai-Burmese border. Partners' focuses on projects with ethnic minorities from Shan State, Burma on both sides of the border.

One thing that caught his eye at our pig pen was the large amount of water still collecting in the pit, even after the roof has been built. He mentioned that when he first began experimenting with deep-litter pig rearing that he had also dug a full meter deep into the ground, as is recommended.

However, in some flat areas the water table level (below ground) is too high and will inundate the deep-litter with water, especially during rainy season. This results in a miserable environment and poor sanitation for the pigs themselves.

His suggestion was to refill 20-30 cm of the pit with soil, and then compensate for this loss in volume by increasing the height of the concrete perimeter by one row of blocks. This will allow us to fill the litter material above ground level.