Municipal Waste Dump
There are 10-15,000 prostitutes under the age of 18 in Phnom Penh- if they are lucky they will make 2 dollars per customer, 60% of which will go to the bar they work from. These are just some of the children found on the dump. However there are many more orphans, their parents lost to AIDS, landmines, drugs and prostitution. Even those children fortunate enough to have parents live in fear of dislocation; some families choose to sell their children to child traffickers for as little as $30, the equivalent of 3 pints in a Singapore pub. With no sense of belonging and no sense of identity, these children turn to one another and forge communities amongst the rubbish dumps. Even when temperatures reach 100 degrees, children as young as five can still be seen trailing after the garbage trucks in the hope of finding a means of purchasing their daily bread. They work a fourteen-hour day, but will be lucky to make one US dollar – less than a cup of coffee in the developed world.
Sporting Chance Foundation will base its first project in Phnom Penh on the Stung Meanchey Waste Dump. Our aim is to give children from the dump an opportunity to develop into young confident adults, if they learn how to kick a ball on the way, then that is a bonus. Our first priority will be to supply the children with the fundamentals of life: food, clothing and shelter. We have already started sending over bits of clothing from Singapore thanks to a junior rugby club here and have received sports kit from a leading sports company. However, we can never have too, so please get in touch with us if you have anything spare. Sporting Chance Foundation also wants to offer the children food and shelter. We have a connection with the Cambodian Rugby Union and hope that we will be able to feed the children from there. The idea is to supply them with breakfast and lunch and then to spend the rest of the morning playing sport. As funds grow, we would like to help educate as many children as we can. There are several public schools in the city thatoperate classes in the afternoon. It doesn’t cost much to send a child to school in Cambodia, however the returns are immeasurable.
Our ultimate aim in Phnom Penh, as it will be with all of our projects, is to set up a centre in the city where children can eat, sleep and have the opportunity to try new activities. We have already started looking at different sites around Phnom Penh and we will continue to do so. As well as having living facilities, we want to find a place where children can develop their sporting attributes. We have calculated that it will cost approximately $30,000 to run the centre each year, a small fee when you consider the lease of life you are giving these children. We have designed a programme, “Hands on Deck”, that will make it easier for everyone to get involved in the project. If you want to contribute to the Phnom Penh project please go to Help Us.