BAAN DEK FOUNDATION

Chiang Mai and Bangkok, Thailand

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BAAN DEK FOUNDATION

Founded in 2002, Baan Dek Foundation (BDF) is a registered Thai Foundation that provides access to essential education, health and safety services for vulnerable children living in urban slums and construction site camps in Chiang Mai, Thailand. For 21 years, Baan Dek Foundation has provided support to marginalized children from disadvantaged communities through access to basic education, safety, and health, supporting over 2,000 vulnerable children every year. BDF works in partnerships with the private and public sectors in Thailand (schools, medical centers, and the Ministries of Health and Education), in order to successfully support the most vulnerable children.

Our impact numbers

2000

Vulnerable children supported every year

50

Marginalized communities of migrants

3500000

Migrant workers cross borders

Fills significant gap in social services

The majority of NGOs working with migrants in Thailand focus their efforts on camps in border regions. BDF is the only entity that specifically address the needs of migrant children living in construction camps. Without Baan Dek’s work, this highly vulnerable population would likely continue to be isolated from general society and cut off from most forms of social services.

Effective assessment and programming social work

Ongoing needs assessments are conducted every 6 months to measure progress and implementations are adjusted as necessary. In addition to the best quality in the execution of their work, their use of technology is highly effective in ensuring the best level of professionalism in their reporting and monitoring.

Innovative and Responsive to challenges

BDF works at the systemic level with large construction conglomerates and government entities to fundamentally and durably improve the conditions of migrant workers. BDF has the vision to take this work to the next level and broaden ambitious impact with the right people and strategy.

BDF's beneficiaries were disproportionally impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and severly lacked access to basic needs and essential services like proper water satination and hygene (WASH )facilities and education.

Sunline Foundation has joined BDF's other partners and providers in bringing the much needed support to migrant workers and their families.

Community infrastructure support:

Enhancement of communities' access to clean water, hand washing stations and secure, gender segregated WASH infrastructure.

Establishment of community safe spaces for children and their parents, creating a dedicated area that contains useful information and is free of crime, substance abuse, and violence

Food and hygiene support: Increasing rate of job losses and soaring amounts of debt resulted in families having no means to support basic needs such as food, water and hygiene products.

BDF provided emergency food and hygiene set support for families who are facing the most difficult situations. Advisors supported them with tailored case management and finding new jobs.  

Non-formal education (NFE) support:

During repeated lockdowns and school closures, children are especially vulnerable, having very limited access to mentally stimulating activities and a socially interactive environment.

Through BDF’s Child Development program, Social Advisors supported children through a range of NFE activities such as delivering educational sets and stationary and art supplies to stimulate and boost children’s cognitive development, helping children complete assignments and remote learning activities from school, and organizing art contests to promote self-expression and encourage positive social interactions and connections.

Our project in numbers

• 446 children benefited from improved living conditions

• 37 Peer Educators were trained

• 3,568 food and hygiene sets were delivered to beneficiaries in Chiang Mai out of which 800 sets were provided by Sunline Foundation

• 385 education sets were distributed, out of which 180 were provided by Sunline Foundation

• 95.00% of school-aged children (6-15 years) were registered for school.

• 52 Youth Peers were trained

Outcomes

Community infrastructure support:

  • Improved living conditions leading to lowered incidence of violence, exposure to substance abuse and sexual harassment
  • Improved level of hygene and decreased number of diseases
  • Emergence of community leaders serving as role models that can further support community members to address WASH-related issuess

Food and hygiene support:

Families who have temporarily lost income receive emergency food support and tailored training.

NFE support:

  • 88.6% of parents agreed that their children have improved their self esteem, emotional well-being, and interaction with other community members (BDF survey)
  • 60% of adult peers - which include parents - agreed that community members have knowledge and confident to access to public services (BDF survey)