Plan Thailand wins award two years in a row

The volunteers, community members and children in Chiang Rai

Plan Thailand is the first place winner of the Prudential Chairman’s Award for the second time in two years. This year the award was for our community forest conservation project in Chiang Rai, while last year it was for our early childhood care and development project in Sri Saket.

Prudential and Plan

The Chairman’s Award was launched in 2006 by Prudential, a UK-based financial services company, to strengthen links between their offices worldwide and local communities. The aim is to encourage their employees to give back to society through volunteering with education projects involving children or elderly people.

Prudential decided to work with Plan because of our reputation as a leading child centred community development organisation, and then selected to support Plan Thailand’s project on community forest conservation. This involved the community in setting up an environmental protection system to ensure the long-term use and protection of their own natural resources.

In addition to Prudential providing financial support, 180 of their staff volunteered to be part of this project. They created posters emphasising the value of forests, which were used as part of the forest conservation curriculum in local schools, and they prepared tree seedlings at their office to give to the villagers to plant. 

“We learned about unity among people here and about forest protection and conservation. We had a chance to help planting trees. This is good”, says Saeng, a young boy from Samakkee Kao School who participated in the project.

Prudential volunteers in the north of Thailand

In June 2007, 40 volunteers travelled over 900 kilometres from Bangkok to Chiang Rai. They gathered with 500 community people and children from many highland villages in the ritual ceremony for forest conservation and tree planting. 

“Thank you so much for having us as a partner,” says Prudential Senior Manager Ms. Panadda Sarmsithong. “We are pleased to be a part of the community development for the children. Many of our staff who could not come today also sent their good wishes, and they have prepared materials like posters to give to the schools here.”

Community forest conservation project

The community forest conservation project was among 50 projects that Prudential has supported. At the end of each year, Prudential’s employees are given the opportunity to vote for the project that they feel has had the greatest positive impact on society to receive the annual Chairman’s Award.
 
“It is our honour that the judges and staff at Prudential recognise that Plan’s programme makes a difference to society,” says Plan Thailand’s Country Director Minty Pande. “The excellent work and efforts come from our dedicated staff at the programme units and definitely from the strong community people and children. Without them, we wouldn’t have achieved this.”

As the first place winner of the award, Plan Thailand will receive £10,000, in addition to the grant they received from Prudential. These funds will be returned to the project, to continue to strengthen the community’s ability to protect their own forest and natural resources.