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.

Starting the Pig/Compost Pilot Project!

This week, Hway Ka Loke Learning Center and the UPLift Program began work on our first Pig/Compost Project in the Mae Sot area.  This project is designed to give migrant schools and families on the Thai/Burmese border more access to income generation opportunities, and to become more self-reliant! (To view the full photo album, click here.)

Work began on Wednesday, when the assistant principal of the school joined Mark and our newest staff member on digging the perimeter of a one-meter deep litter, and doing their best to clear the top layer of soil and grass. 

Thursday provided some more progress:

...and then Friday just happened to be a school holiday, which meant that some of the older students interested in agriculture were available to give some assistance!

Work should finish on Saturday, and we can move on to the next step--planning and constructing the walls and roof.

Pig Rearing for Burmese Migrant Schools--Project Update

Staff and Volunteers at New Life

This week Mark visited New Life Foundation in Chiang Rai in order to learn more about organic farming and to meet another specialist in the area of deep-litter pig rearing.  As a result, our Pig-Compost pilot project is set to begin in Mae Sot next week. (For photos of Mark's visit click here.)

New Life Foundation is a recovery center for those dealing with drug addiction issues.  UPLift first met New Life staff during a Natural Farming training we attended together in March.  Julien, the current manager of New Life, has recently begun a revamping of the site's farmland in order to generate income on a larger scale in order to self-fund their operations.

To do this, New Life is working alongside Ajan Suthat, a former chemical engineer who has recently found a passion for organic farming.  Compared to other teachers and programs on the topic of Natural Farming, Ajan Suthat uses a more scientific, data-based approach to refine pig rearing, organic farming, and compost production in order to help impoverished families learn how to do these things for themselves.

Ajan Suthat (center) working with New Life employees

With his methods for improving pig feed, raw material inputs and overall pig health, UPLift's pilot project in Mae Sot will improve considerably, most notably the reduction of time needed to increase a pig's weight to 100kg (our previous estimate of 5 months has reduced to 3 months).

Speaking of the pilot project at Hway Ka Loke school in Mae Sot, we will sit down with the school staff and begin the planning process next week!

5 Minutes to Change the World, and How We're Doing It!

Last week, UPLift and Room 2 Grow staff completed their video entry for the Project Inspire competition, sponsored by the UN Women's Organization and Mastercard.  This competition gives a $25,000 grant to the group with the best plan for improving women's lives through social entrepreneurship and financial literacy.  Check out the video above!

As you know, over the past year UPLift has been working with a number of families on a city landfill near the Thai-Burmese border in Tak province, Thailand to help increase their food security and income through a variety of pilot projects.  Two of these projects have proven themselves to be lasting, effective, and most importantly drawing the interest of other families on the landfill.  With this in mind, Paul Hancock from UPLift realized that women have been responsible for our most effective pilot projects and have the power to change the status quo on and around the landfill.

Now that we wish to scale up our activities to include other families, having a grant opportunity such as this that matches our goals is fantastic, and we are "inspired" to continue our work in this area.

Income Generation on the Landfill--June Update



Since February we have been working with motivated women on a landfill near the Thai-Burmese border in Tak province to start a rugmaking venture.  Given the low incomes garnered by day labor and picking recyclables there, having a new source of income would be a great way to break the current cycle of poverty there. 

After providing training and materials for an initial workshop, one pregnant woman named Thin Thin Khaing picked up the idea and began making large numbers of rugs, using materials found on the landfill! (see previous blog post from Izara Arts here)

After three months of dedicated work, Thin Thin has made over 100 rugs and has sold 62 of them.  This has provided her family with an additional 1,240 Thai baht of income ($38 USD)...considering that entire families sometimes make 50 baht per day in the landfill, this supplemental business has given her more financial flexibility, as well as prestige within the landfill community.  In fact, several other women have seen her success and are now interested in weaving rugs as well!