Recent News & Updates!

The Sewing room:

During the first half of this year, we have begun implementing exciting plans in the Sewing Room for this year – we are aiming during 2011 to become more professional in our production and capacity, and have commenced new training courses, run by a professional trainer to the garment industry in Cambodia. Ten of our best producers in The Sewing Room have attended 3 training modules in pattern cutting. We also chose 16 clients to attend production management training courses, which were held in April and May, and all 16 graduated, and are putting their skills to practice in our production rooms. We have been purchasing new production equipment and having coaching from a professional production trainer, to increase efficiency, quality and productivity.


We added a large number of new products to our range and these are available in our online catalogue - www.daughtersofcambodia.org/downloads/Daughters%20Catalogue%202011.pdf

Our new catalogue includes the beautiful jewellery made at Daughters, which uses locally sourced raw materials and several re-cycled objects. We have added lots of pretty accessories and cushions. We have also launched our beautiful new sleepwear range, designed by British designer Emma Hawthorne exclusively for Daughters. It is made from soft, light cotton in pretty colours and trimmed with hand-made lace. Emma is returning to Cambodia this summer to work at Daughters longer term, and we are excited about that.


Jewellery

Since opening our shop last year, we have found that our biggest seller, of all the products we make at Daughters, is the jewellery. We have recently hired an additional 3 clients from Daughters Sewing Room to make jewellery, making a total of 7 girls full time in the jewellery program. In addition, we have 4 of our boys in Sons program cutting the coconut pieces that we use on the jewellery along with other accessories such as buckles and buttons.

Wwere blessed to have several designers working with us since January, 2 short term jewellery designers and an accessories designer.


Silk Screen Printing:

WE have been working hard to improve our t-shirt program, under Sons of Cambodia. We have 2 volunteers, Chet and Amarja, both from the USA, who are managing the production and systems, such as inventory flow, management of orders, and systems for tracking stock. We have a silk screen expert, Matt from the USA, who is Amarja is training the clients in silk screen printing skills, and Matt is also working on some exciting new designs.


Other Skills Trainings

Two clients in our Visitor Centre commenced a twelve month training in management, provided by Hagar Career Pathways. They will return to Daughters at the end of the training and use their skills to each manage 2 of the small businesses based in our Visitor Centre. We are very excited for them!



Social Services Programs

Our social work team, now 7 people, has been very busy and active. Their work is often dealing with critical situations and emergencies involving domestic violence, or interventions to prevent the trafficking of babies or young children. Another very common problem is the clients’ lack of skill in managing their money. We have appointed one of our counsellors as money management counsellor, since many clients engage in gambling, reckless spending, or losing money because they do not keep it safe. Many also have debts that mean they cannot buy food or pay rent. We are working with them to help them reduce their debts, save a portion of their salaries, and manage their money better.

We have seen some recent successes in our men’s project. This is a new project working with husbands who perpetrate violence, or engage in other dysfunctional behaviours. We have made referrals of 3 husbands to a residential treatment program for substance addictions, and they are making extremely positive progress. We have been building relationship with a few other husbands, and have also seen them implement growing behaviour changes through the behaviour management techniques our social workers have been teaching them. We often find that their children are caught up in the family problems and some have been at risk of being trafficked as acts of revenge or due to neglect. We have been able to successfully prevent several babies recently from being trafficked. We have also made 2 referrals to a women’s refuge for victims of domestic violence, and this intervention has been very valuable in proving safety and support for those victims.

We promoted one client in the Sons program to be supervisor of the other boys. Since coming to Sons, he demonstrated radical lifestyle change from the first day, and has grown by leaps and bounds in taking initiative and responsibility. He is a fantastic peer mentor to the other boys, who respect him and learn from his example. His work is diligent and conscientious. We are very proud of him.


Workshop Program

We have held educational workshops recently on the following topics:

The importance of hydration (drinking enough water)
Emotional abuse education
Making healthy choices when selecting a mate
Prevention of Diarrhea
STD education
Correct use of medicines
Preventing intestinal parasites
The Immune System
Drug & substance misuse workshops (external trainers)
How to implement a savings scheme & money management
Hepatitis, dengue and malaria prevention
Education in the use and misuse of medications
Parenting skills



Medical Program:

We had an outbreak of rubella among our clients earlier this year, and due to the steady number of pregnant clients, we developed some new health policies which we have been implementing for the purposes of infection control. Rubella is particularly harmful to the foetus in the first trimester of pregnancy, and is very widespread among the community at large in Cambodia. We introduced isolation measures for clients with rubella and the incidences were eradicated at Daughters, which we were thankful for.

We have widened our infection control measures to include a range of other diseases that are important to eliminate without further spread.


Photography Classes:

We have 5 clients who are learning photography skills for a project which we ran for 4 months. They were trained by a photographer George Hsia from the USA. We will be producing a photojournal shortly as a result of this project. It was a great opportunity for them to learn this beautiful skill.