Spirit Foundation
THE SPIRIT FOUNDATIONS: The right to a happy childhood:
Who we are: The Spirit Foundations was founded in 2002 by a group of Khmer Tour Leaders with the aim of helping the children of Cambodia. As employees of an international tour operator, we began helping by bringing food, clothes and school stationary to poor families we meet whilst touring. We collected supplies from launderette’s and some of our generous passengers. We shared a part of our salary to offer basic needs and our time to provide some basic English to children of poor villages. In 2006, after years of experience in toursim, we decided to start up our own travel agency and to extend our charity work.
Children’s life in Cambodia: More than one third of Cambodians live below the poverty line, struggling to survive on less than $1 a day. Poverty is especially pervasive in rural areas and among children, who constitute more than half of the country's population (Unicef). Children's safety is substandard in Cambodia; 60,000 children under 5 years of age still die every year! The numerous reasons include; disease - although a lot are preventable by vaccination - diarrhoea, respiratory infections, malnutrition, insalubrity, HIV prevalence and accidents (road, drowning, UXO). In addition, poverty effects children’s schooling (unaffordable tuition, child labour) and in turn this increases their vulnerability (street children, exploitation including sexual abuse, drug and alcohol issues).
Our objectives: Every child is a gift and should receive the best care so they can grow in happiness within a loving family. The aim of our contribution is to provide better living conditions for the children of our country and therefore improve their future. For this, children must receive the basic needs. We focus on bringing them the 4 following necessities: protection, education, health and a healthy supply of drinking water.
Our project: Spirit Asia Travel donates 5% of its total profit directly to The Spirit Foundations. A large amount of this will be donated to other NGO’s and charity organizations working in Cambodia on the 4 topics mentioned above. The rest will be channeled into our personal charity projects (payment of school fees and supplies for selected impoverished children, the building of water pumps in poor villages, free transfers to hospitals for children from remote areas who need medical care).
(WE ARE CONCERNED ABOUT OUR CHILDREN FOR THEY ARE THE FUTURE OF OUR BELOVED CAMBODIA...)
