Children living with a disability are amongst the most vulnerable in Cambodian society. Few services exist in-country, especially a specialist residential centre like DT’s. People living with an intellectual disability are stigmatized and discriminated against within communities. In Cambodia people with disabilities, are more likely to live poverty and people with disabilities suffer from social exclusion and discrimination. In addition, children with disabilities require highly individualized and tailored care that few institutions can offer, especially in the long-term.
DT’s Phnom Penh centre shelters up to 30 children and young people living with physical and/or intellectual disabilities. Many of the children are former street children, as well as children who were abandoned or trafficked. Residents benefit from medical care, physical therapy, occupational therapy, psycho-social support, and also attend school outside the centre when appropriate. DT supports children to develop skills, enabling them to gain autonomy and re-integration when possible.
A boy gardening in the courtyard, his unique bicycle wheelchair beside him. Damnok Toek Centre For Children With Disabilities, Phnom Pen. Damnok Toek provide special education and leisure activities and long-term care for children who have intellectual or physical disabilities. Photo by Angela Cornish/ARGUS
Staff capacity building in disability
Since the beginning of this project in Phnom Penh, one of the main challenges has been hiring qualified staff able to work with children with intellectual disabilities. To face this constraint, regular trainings have been organized with partner organizations to develop and improve the staff’s capacities and adapt them to the children’s intellectual and physical needs.
Find us on field work
Learn more about how DT’s poipet work to assist vulnerable children
2017 Damnok Toek was awarded by Child 10 Organization in Sweden
2018 Damnok Toek was awarded by Prix Caritas.
Read More about Prix Caritas
Prix Caritas goes to Cambodia
The Prix Caritas 2018 was presented in Lucerne to the Cambodian doctor Sovannarith Sam. Yves Serra, CEO and President of Georg Fischer, paid tribute to the award winner’s commitment. He has been actively engaged in promoting child protection and children’s rights in Cambodia for decades. At the core of his efforts are disadvantaged children who have become victims of enslavement, human trafficking and prostitution.
Yves Serra, CEO of Georg Fischer, Sovannarith Sam and Hugo Fasel, director of Caritas Switzerland. Photo: Priska Ketterer
Sovannarith Sam is the executive director of the child protection organisation ‘Damnok Toek’. It takes care of around 3,500 marginalised children each year in the cities of Phnom Penh, Poipet and Neak Loeung. In Poipet, on the border with Thailand, Sovannarith Sam runs various drop-in centres in which approximately 750 children, who live and work on the street, find refuge. They keep themselves and their families afloat – by carrying heavy loads, collecting waste, as beggars or, in the worst case, as child prostitutes. In the drop-in centres, the children can recover from the strains of their work. They are given a hot meal and can have a shower.
‘Damnok Toek’ also offers these children a basic education. Wherever possible, they are prepared for admission to a mainstream state school. In cooperation with public authorities and private business, the aid organisation also enables the boys and girls to gain a vocational qualification and helps them to get apprenticeships, work placements or jobs.
Yves Serra, CEO and President of Georg Fischer as well as President of the ‘Clean Water’ Foundation, praised the award winner’s commitment as pioneering: ‘Sovannarith Sam is always guided by a threefold perspective. By giving children and young people a roof over their head in the drop-in centres, he is providing life-saving protection. But he doesn’t stop at that. Through education and training, he endeavours to reintegrate the children into society and to give them a future. And lastly, by raising awareness, he wants to prevent children from being deprived of rights and protection.’
Human beings with an inviolable dignity
According to Yves Serra, the commitment of the Cambodian doctor is shaped by his conviction that first and foremost, children are human beings with an inviolable dignity and with fundamental rights. The award of the Prix Caritas 2018 is intended to encourage him to continue his commitment to child protection and children’s rights.
The Prix Caritas is awarded each year to persons who distinguish themselves by their great professional expertise and humanity, as well as their long-term and innovative engagement. The prize money of CHF 10,000 goes to one of the award winner’s projects.
Their smiling is our commitment in mission to assist them.
Intellectual Disabilities
Intellectual Disabilities
Children living with a disability are amongst the most vulnerable in Cambodian society. Few services exist in-country, especially a specialist residential centre like DT’s. People living with an intellectual disability are stigmatized and discriminated against within communities. In Cambodia people with disabilities, are more likely to live poverty and people with disabilities suffer from social exclusion and discrimination. In addition, children with disabilities require highly individualized and tailored care that few institutions can offer, especially in the long-term.
DT’s Phnom Penh centre shelters up to 30 children and young people living with physical and/or intellectual disabilities. Many of the children are former street children, as well as children who were abandoned or trafficked. Residents benefit from medical care, physical therapy, occupational therapy, psycho-social support, and also attend school outside the centre when appropriate. DT supports children to develop skills, enabling them to gain autonomy and re-integration when possible.
Staff capacity building in disability
Since the beginning of this project in Phnom Penh, one of the main challenges has been hiring qualified staff able to work with children with intellectual disabilities. To face this constraint, regular trainings have been organized with partner organizations to develop and improve the staff’s capacities and adapt them to the children’s intellectual and physical needs.
Find us on field work
Learn more about how DT’s poipet work to assist vulnerable children
2017 Damnok Toek was awarded by Child 10 Organization in Sweden
2018 Damnok Toek was awarded by Prix Caritas.
Read More about Prix Caritas
Prix Caritas goes to Cambodia
The Prix Caritas 2018 was presented in Lucerne to the Cambodian doctor Sovannarith Sam. Yves Serra, CEO and President of Georg Fischer, paid tribute to the award winner’s commitment. He has been actively engaged in promoting child protection and children’s rights in Cambodia for decades. At the core of his efforts are disadvantaged children who have become victims of enslavement, human trafficking and prostitution.
Sovannarith Sam is the executive director of the child protection organisation ‘Damnok Toek’. It takes care of around 3,500 marginalised children each year in the cities of Phnom Penh, Poipet and Neak Loeung. In Poipet, on the border with Thailand, Sovannarith Sam runs various drop-in centres in which approximately 750 children, who live and work on the street, find refuge. They keep themselves and their families afloat – by carrying heavy loads, collecting waste, as beggars or, in the worst case, as child prostitutes. In the drop-in centres, the children can recover from the strains of their work. They are given a hot meal and can have a shower.
‘Damnok Toek’ also offers these children a basic education. Wherever possible, they are prepared for admission to a mainstream state school. In cooperation with public authorities and private business, the aid organisation also enables the boys and girls to gain a vocational qualification and helps them to get apprenticeships, work placements or jobs.
Yves Serra, CEO and President of Georg Fischer as well as President of the ‘Clean Water’ Foundation, praised the award winner’s commitment as pioneering: ‘Sovannarith Sam is always guided by a threefold perspective. By giving children and young people a roof over their head in the drop-in centres, he is providing life-saving protection. But he doesn’t stop at that. Through education and training, he endeavours to reintegrate the children into society and to give them a future. And lastly, by raising awareness, he wants to prevent children from being deprived of rights and protection.’
Human beings with an inviolable dignity
According to Yves Serra, the commitment of the Cambodian doctor is shaped by his conviction that first and foremost, children are human beings with an inviolable dignity and with fundamental rights. The award of the Prix Caritas 2018 is intended to encourage him to continue his commitment to child protection and children’s rights.
The Prix Caritas is awarded each year to persons who distinguish themselves by their great professional expertise and humanity, as well as their long-term and innovative engagement. The prize money of CHF 10,000 goes to one of the award winner’s projects.
Their smiling is our commitment in mission to assist them.