Facilitated by Heifer Cambodia staff, Ms. Lesley Byrne, a charitable people from Rhinelander, Wisconsin, the Unite States, made her visit to poor communities supported by Heifer in two provinces - Siem Reap and Battambang – from July 21-24. The visit aimed at seeking feasibility in assisting the rural communities in children

education, clean water and sanitation. During her visit, Lesley was impressed by cohesive and cooperative communities as men and women are working together to strengthen their families, helping each other improve their lives, and building a sustainable community. Food security has been strengthened gradually after they participated in the project.

In meeting with the project members, a critical issue on clean water and hygiene was identified. To reduce difficulties in lack of water faced by the partner families in dry season, Lesley donated nine water wells to them in two communities of the two provinces. The donated wells will benefit more than 60 families living nearby, by supplying clean water not only for drinking (for people and animals), but also for seeding their kitchen garden as they are able to enhance their productivities in growing vegetables and crops and planting fruit trees to give more yields during dry season.

She also encouraged the community members to think of clean village and sanitation/hygiene. To take part in improving the environment, she provided assistance with the partner families’ matching fund to build 21 latrines for them. However, the latrines have to be built at least 15 meters far away from water sources to avoid contamination of ground water.

During her visit to one of the three existing children club supported by Heifer project, Lesley provided reading books and some educational posters to the club and two sets of school uniform each to 30 poorest school kids in the community. Moreover, she encouraged club master to mainstream life skill into academic curriculum for the children, including horticulture growing, environment, health and so forth.

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