via Khmer NZ
Jul 20, 2010
By Lauren Grimson
As the Men at Work boys so aptly put it, Australians come from the “land of plenty”.
All too often, we take basic survival items like food, shelter and fresh water for granted because they are so readily available to us.
Even the most fiscally strained Australians have access to the public health, education, housing and Government assistance.
On the other side of the world in Cambodia, people are not so blessed. Poverty-stricken families are forced to fend for themselves with no government assistance and are faced with a public health system that has limited capacity to deal with primary health concerns.
More than 40 per cent of Cambodian children are malnourished and problems such as acute respitory infection, Dengue, diarrhoea, Typhoid and dehydration are almost constant issues in rural areas. Over 10,000 children in Cambodia live on the streets and over 100,000 children do not participate in education or play activities because they have been prematurely sent to the workforce.
Following a trip to the slums of Cambodia, Penrith-based psychologist, Margarita Parrish, decided to fill the void, launching a charity designed to provide food, shelter and education for poverty-stricken adults and children in the slums of the Asian country.
Ms Parrish’s charity, Food For Everyone (F4E) aims to not only provide food for poverty-stricken Cambodian families, but to teach them how to become self-sufficient and feed themselves.
“This is the key to breaking the seemingly eternal poverty cycle that engulfs the people of Cambodia,” said Ms Parrish.
“Children who live in filth and eat dirt are stripped of dignity. They don’t even think they deserve basic human rights such as food and shelter.”
F4E has launched its Basic Shelter Appeal to raise funds to build much needed shelter for families who live in “Freedom Village”, a township home to 72 desperate families who were previously tagged as slum-dwellers.
To make a difference to the lives of people living in “Freedom Village” F4E needs 47 house sponsors at $100 each, 19 walls and roof sponsors at $50 each, seven walls sponsors at $30 each, and 72 mosquito net sponsors at $5 each.
For the price of a coat, you could provide a family in need with a roof for their new home. But if that’s out of your price range, for as little as $5 you can make a difference in someone’s life by providing them with a mosquito net to protect against fatal Malaria.
Be a part of something bigger than you! Every donation, no matter how small, has the power to make a difference.
For more information on F4E, visit the website http://www.food4everyone.net/ .
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