Dear Friends and Supporters,
I am writing to you this Spring with a sense of optimism matched by the blossoming weather. We’ve had our share of surprises, but the story of the year is one of progress that I’m delighted to present to you.
Covid-19 has continued to be a challenge, with rates having unfortunately increased in Thailand and projects being delayed due to community outbreaks. Our team has been fantastic in overcoming every obstacle thrown at them, and with some occasional creative thinking we’ve been able to continue all our services and mitigate against any disruption.
Growth in Quality and Quantity
KHT held our AGM in January, and a key theme that came out was growth, both in the quality and quantity of our work. With a renewed focus on impact data and monitoring & evaluation, and the return of travel allowing us to get greater input from our Karen communities and stakeholders, we have an opportunity to drive further improvements in the depth and breadth of our projects.
We are adding conservation community-education sessions to our agriculture and livelihoods work, leaning into recent findings that our irrigation dams can be powerful tools in protecting local environments. We are implementing the findings from a major education strategy review which is detailed in the newsletter. For our water systems, we have just closed out a multi-year project dataset and are analysing the results. Overall, our goal is to ensure that our projects each deliver the maximum possible good, and then to try get them to reach the maximum number of Karen communities.
A Warm Thank You
I would like to thank everyone for the welcome that I’ve received coming in as Interim Director. We’ve seen great support from our existing donors and partners and have welcomed some new ones into the KHT family. Your help and guidance has been invaluable in this period of transition.
With the rains starting in Thailand, we’re looking to the next season of irrigation and WASH projects and have just begun work on our 2022-2023 education programme. Any donations, however large or small, will help us to keep driving forwards and deliver the work that our Karen communities deserve.
Yours sincerely,
Matt Jenkins, Interim Director of KHT
