Currently, we work with over 2000 families in 30
villages throughout
Sor Thoeun and
Sang Chheang
Khnong Phnom is a commune located on the top of Phnom Kulan Mountain in Svay
Leu district, Siem Reap Province around 60 kilometers North-East of the
provincial city. There are 8 villages in this commune, but only 7
villages are selected by NK for A21SL project operation.
Most of people
living in this mountainous area are poor and depend upon rice crop and other
food productions such as banana, coconut, taro, black bean and
pineapple. Many of the people are illiterate because there
isn't a school big enough for all the villages. Where there are
schools, there are no permenant teachers to teach the children.
Illiteracy makes it difficult for people to improve their
livelihood. Therefore, efforts should be made to build capacity to them
both in theory and practices. The project found that the most urgent
needs are skills and knowledge to increase yield production.
Sor Thoeun and
Sang Chheang are living in Thmey village, Khnong Phnom commune. They took
their course on on-farm activities focusing on taro, black bean and
pineapple growing that was organized by the project in cooperation with
Department of Agriculture Forestry and Fishery for self-help group in their
village. Since then, they have started to put this knowledge into
practice to improve the family’s income. By using grants from
the group, Sor Thoeun grew black beans that were planted in June 2008 with 10kg
seeds. They will be ready to harvest in January 2009, where
they expect to harvest at least 300kg. He also grew his 300
pineapples, which were planted in August 2008. Moreover, he raised
chickens, and expects to sell at a price of 160,000 riel. At the same
time, Sang Chheang works with his plot that planted taro mixed with some banana
trees. He planted taro in June 2008 with 600kg young taro, and expects to
harvest 5,000kg in January 2009. If he sells them all, he will earn
around 4 million riels ($1,000 USD).
Sor Thoeun and
Sang Chheang said “we are very happy to get a chance to be the self-help group
members, who besides taken training, but also get grant support to start such a
business, and with a good practice we have been doing, we are willing to share
experience to our neighbors which is part of improving community livelihood”.
Urm Naign, from Kauk Daung Thmai, has three children and a wife
who has been ill for a long period of time. She cannot move her arms and
legs and is incapable of doing any type of work to help out the family.
Neary Khmer has been working to help out Urm Naign since 2006 by giving him
loans from the village group. He also earns some money by selling things
from his house.
After earning
some extra money, he is able to make rice wine, raise pigs, and in the rainy
season, he can plant vegetable, all to sell for profit. He has also
managed to make extra money to send is children to school, to fix his house,
and to chip money into the communal group to get a latrine and hand-pumped
well.
Learning and
trained by Neary Khmer, he now has the aspiration to think things through,
contemplate, and solve problems in a peaceful manner. For example, he no
longer becomes angry with his wife, whereas before, he blamed his wife for
being sick and incapable of helping out the family. He has become more
outspoken in the community and no longer believes that no one will listen to
him because he is poor. He also believes that he learned many things from
Neary Khmer and is able to teach others what he has learned from Neary Khmer so
that they too can help their families grow.
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