Tabitha newsletters
October 2021
Dear Friends and partners,
This is a longish newsletter as we have completed our annual report and our budgets and plans for this year. I would like to share some of the highlights of this past year as well as our dreams for this current program year.
The Covid pandemic has caused much pain and suffering in Cambodia with many ill from the virus, the lock-downs and the economic devastation. Despite this, the Tabitha staff have managed to work through difficult situations and have accomplished much.
The core of our program is savings: Our families saved $ 671,750.50 this yearbut what is the miracle is the purchase and life changes brought about –they purchased $1,865,280 worth of goods andservices, changing their lives from absolute poverty to subsistence levels.
In Income generation, especially in agriculture and fishing – 2,426 families were able to raise animals such as pigs, chickens, ducks, cows, etc. Another 3,792 families were able to grow crops such as rice and vegetables year-round – it is so very good.
September 2021
Dear friends and partners,
Good morning to each of you. The pandemic continues to devastate the country of Cambodia. Many people have lost their jobs and many small and medium size businesses have closed, most permanently. The tourism town of Siem Reap resembles a ghost town as the hotels and restaurants are closed and empty. It is all so difficult.
August 2021
Dear Friends and Partners,
Today’s newsletter is a little different. I have written my memoirs of 25 years of my work setting up Tabitha Cambodia and its programs. I could have written 10 books of the past 25 years but that’s not feasible. The book will tell you about why Cambodia, my values and principles of what and how I chose to do Tabitha; about when I did it and about who I worked with and how that happened. Hopefully, it will answer some of your questions about who I am and why I did this.
July 2021
Dear friends and partners,
Cambodia has been suffering from an upsurge of the Covid 19 virus. Many people are struggling to put food on the table, to find a job, to keep their families safe. The Delta strain of the virus is causing untold numbers of families to be affected. The tentacles of this virus are reaching out to all corners of the country It is all so very sad.
June 2021
Dear friends and partners,
I have exciting news this beautiful day. Tabitha Canada is doing a Virtual Mission for Tabitha Cambodia starting July1 for the savings/partnership program. I would like to share the story of one of our families.
May 2021
Dear friends and partners,
The past 6 weeks in Cambodia have been extremely difficult as the Covid virus with its variants has taken hold in the country. Up until then, Cambodia had relatively few cases of the virus but it has now multiplied to over 20,000 cases. The economic impact of the pandemic has been manifolding with many people losing their sources of income before the variant outbreak. Now that misery has been compounded by the disease affecting many people.
April 2021
Dear friends and partners,
In this month of April, we celebrate Khmers New Year, a time when families get together throughout the country to be and rejoice together. But this year the Covid pandemic has struck Cambodia with a fierceness experienced in so many countries around the world and the New Year’s celebrations will be muted and quiet. For so many people in Cambodia the economic hardships that accompany the pandemic have many worried about where the next meal will come from.
January 2021
Dear friends and partners,
The COVID-19 pandemic has started our year with economic hardships in this land of sorrows. Despite the issues revolving around the pandemic our children have returned to school. Mann Tola, is 15 years old and lives with his family in Svay Rieng Province. His family has been in the Tabitha savings programs for 6 years. In that time, they were able to save for small business, raise animals such as pigs, chickens and cows. Tola’s sister and himself got bicycles so that they could go to school.
4 years ago, Tabitha helped to get a school for the village. Before that, school was held in a one room thatch building that was not very good. Each day the sun came through the broken thatch and on rainy days the students couldn’t go to school at all. The room was overcrowded as 634 students studied in that one room. The students found it difficult to learn very much.
December 2020
Merry Chritmas
Dear friends and partners,
During this month of Christmas in the West – on behalf of the staff and families of Tabitha Cambodia – I would like to wish each of you Merry Christmas and the best in the Year 2021. It has been a hard year with the pandemic – a year of not knowing what the future will bring – a year of re-learning how to live our lives within the confines of a global pandemic.
November 2020
Dear friends and partners,
During this Covid pandemic, news from Cambodia is not good. It is not the Covid virus that threatens the lives of many Cambodians, rather it’s the collateral economic virus that threatens so many in this country of sorrows. I have received a number of reports of families losing their land and their homes because of their inability to repay micro-finance loans because of jobs and incomes and their easy access to loans – loans that they don’t understand, loans that they are unable to repay. The current debt load per person is $3,800.00 USD – a staggering amount for the majority of people who earn less than $200.00 USD per month. It saddens me to hear again of children being sold, of land and homes being sold or seized – of lives lived precariously once again being destroyed.
