CFI’s ongoing projects are programs developed with the help of individuals and organizations that are part of The Coalition. In their minds resonates the idea that they can contribute to the creation of opportunities in forgotten communities by helping us improve our projects.

CFI is always looking for innovative business models and projects that can develop and enhance the livelihoods of communities that are denied access to economic development. As a visitor you may visit our Online Community to follow the development of our projects. 

Local Mosquito Net

A striking fact in developing nations is that it can be extremely hard to find some basic and necessary products that are manufactured locally. In Cambodia, most mosquito nets are typically imported from Vietnam, Thailand or China.

CFI’s idea with this project is to combine an economic opportunity while fighting malaria. We intend to have mosquito nets manufactured domestically and designed by locals in order to ensure that the product meets the requirements and needs of the local population.

Mosquito net manufacturing can also provide marketable skills to the community by training the locals in weaving.

Sambour Nutritional Garden

The village of Sambour is located about 25km away from the archeological site of Angkor Wat. Not different from other rural villages in Cambodia, after the demise of the Khmer Rouge rule in 1979, Sambour still suffered from the skirmishes between the isolated & desperate hard line Khmer Rouge leadership and the Vietnamese Incursion Forces. The situation lingered there until the late nineties which denied all prospect of socio-economical growth for Sambour.

The Sambour village currently faces many challenges. Out of these challenges the school and the children’s nutrition have been identified as priorities with the local leadership. The idea is therefore to ensure the reconstruction of the school which will be overseen by our ‘partners in philanthropy’ Cambodia, We Care a US partner organization and the Shinta Mani Hotel our local partner.
In a spirit of collaboration, CFI and Fellows of the Coalition are currently working on a nutritional garden project that can hopefully provide a good source of nutrients to the local children. The idea is to deploy a garden that would comply with agricultural best practices by minimizing inputs and linking crop selection with the children’s nutritional deficiencies. The approach that was selected is called Permaculture, a practice that is respectful of the environment and drastically minimizes required input so as to make the garden more sustainable and independent.

Our collaborative work in Sambour will hopefully provide a safe learning environment for the student and improve their health via better nutrition. I invite you to review our Flickr stream where the story of Sambour is told.

CFI is currently working with Jason Leahey, an American expat in Siem Reap who took a course in Permaculture. He has been nothing short of an asset in this project and has completed the plotting of the terrain. The next step for us is to establish a process to assess the children’s nutritional deficiencies and then select the crops based on our findings.

Help, counsel and guidance from individuals with a medical background would be most helpful in taking this project to the next level for the children of Sambour.

Ikat Project

The ikat project is a venture which aims at creating sustainable employment where little is to be found. Ikat is a unique and traditional weaving technique found in different places in the world such as Asia, Middle East and Africa. In Cambodia this weaving technique has long been around, the temples of the Angkorian City near Siem Reap bear the marks of the importance and ubiquity of the patterns and the type of fabric. Every single Apsara or mythical ‘nymph’ wears an ikat-like cloth around their waists.

Ikat refers to the technique by which threads of textile (silk or cotton) are independently dyed. The Dying of each thread will eventually create a pattern on the total surface of the fabric as they are woven on the loom. The trick is to make sure that that each thread is correctly positioned horizontally and that the order of each thread throughout the piece of fabric is respected. Here is an example below:

The idea is to move away from silk which can be burdensome to maintain and would tend to look fancy and drive costs up. The substitute would be cotton.

Currently ikats are all traditionally designed and silk woven on the local market. While the skills put into the labor is of the highest grade, the end product does not seem to get to western prospects. By giving a little help and creative counsel we can help villages tap into new markets thus generating better income and margins for the households.

The project is currently based in the Takeo province where there is a big history of weaving. CFI is currently overseeing the planning and execution of operations. Together we have completed our first cotton ikat and blend of cotton and silk.