Improving the health and hospitality in an orphanage

« Cambodia still lives in a "post-genocide/war" period. Social infrastructures are nonexistent and the orphanages can only subsist on the generosity of the NGOs and donors. This project is also valuable because it helps to federate the law students and teachers in Cambodia and in France.
And above all, it addresses the issue of "minimum rights of the child": to have acceptable living conditions from the standpoint of health, hygiene and safety »

Thirith Boun-Chan

At Doeun Kor, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, the Kien Khleang orphanage lacks almost everything to provide decent sanitary conditions for the 119 children that it accommodates. Without any showers, they have to wash themselves in the nearby river, exposed to the public view and in water that is often very dirty.
Without a mosquito net above their beds, they also suffer from mosquito bites - with the constant risk of being bitten by an insect that carries dengue fever, a mortal disease.

Besides, the school training they receive is also very inadequate, due to the lack of financial resources and appropriate facilities: ten small handicapped children are unable to go to school because of their handicap, and as for the healthy children,
they only have the "right" to a half-day of school per day.

In Lyon, the Association Droit, Développement et Partenariats Francophones (ADDPF) which gathers together students, post-graduates and teachers of the Lyon 3 Law Faculty, has approached this orphanage through the involvement of the local Cambodian community.

A shower building equipped with a proper sanitation system

Thanks to numerous contacts with the staff of the orphanage, the priorities were set for improving the living conditions of the young orphans. ADDPF is therefore mobilizing to find the necessary funds in order to deal with the school and health aspects.
The Lyon association is collecting the funds required to enable the 119 students, healthy and handicapped, to have a complete school education. It also plans to build a shower building equipped with a sanitation and water storage system, making sure to build one sanitary block for the girls and another for the boys.

The Veolia fondation was asked both to provide the financing for the "shower" aspect and to provide advice on the best sanitation system to be installed.
This support is indispensable to ensure that the young orphans welcomed at Kien Khleang can finally obtain satisfactory living conditions, without any risk to their health.