Dear our beloved friends and supporters
It has been quite a while and I hope you all are doing well.
I am writing to update you on our little village work. This year has become the 6th year we started our assistance in the village. The flowers plantation started in 2013 and the villagers have been continuing them beautifully.
Income generation and livelihood
Since the beginning of 2016 we stopped growing flowers in the village because of the dry season crisis, however this month we start planning them again after the rain – we have now 15,000 bulbs of gladiolus, and 5,000 bulbs of liatris. We now stick with two types of flowers that the villagers chose because they were successfully planted flowers for the past three years. This year we are planting in three more nearby villages one of which is in a secondary school and piloting the water irrigation system. I am travelling to Luang Prabang again to monitor the plantation in August.
Education
We continue to provide Ban Pa Nor primary school lunches as part of the school and scholarship, as well as teacher’s education. This year we want to support also students of the secondary school with scholarships.
Malibarn Flowershop
We are now on our second year. The social enterprises business has been running well. Some months we sold well; while some months not. We came up with a creative idea to also turn the upstairs space for holding a workshop to cover up our rent which went well i.e. we have been holding three flower arrangement workshops, and two tailor making workshops, and we will be organizing an art exhibition in October this year.
We also sub-contracted lovely café Maison Matilda to open a coffee shop and living in our little space to attract more customers and make a lovingly ambience.
I personally and ultimately thank you for all of you to always be there for me through thick and thin 🙂 After August, we will update you again once the flowers started to bloom.
With love always,
Pann Kamonrat