FOOD4LIFE PROJECT

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To provide and distribute essential supplies to local people due to the impact of Covid and the collapse of international tourism.

International tourism has been growing on the Samui for the past 30 years or more, ever since Bangkok Airways opened the airport here in 1989. Over the years more and more people came here to work in this flourishing industry that seemed capable of growing forever with unlimited job opportunities for everyone: skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled workers.

From gardeners and tailors to hotel staff and all the auxillary services the type of employment was as varied as the nationalities of the millions of visitors who came to enjoy this famous island.

However, as a result of Covid and the closure of Thailand’s borders there has been a complete collapse in the tourist industry destroying the livelihoods of local people. More and more families are finding it impossible to provide essential food.

The number of total passengers at Samui International Airport had reached 2.5 million 2019 but according to recent reports since the re-opening of boarders under the SamuiPlus program in July 2021 there have been just 1,018 arrivals.

In response Rotary started a Food4Life appeal with first food deliveries back in April 2020. By June 2020 we were making regular food distributions to the hardest hit communities with financial support from kind local individuals, charities and businesses like Sisters of Samui, Asajan Festival, Sons of the Moon, Perfunction, and Christopher Bader from Blue Lagoon Resort, Chaweng.

Since early 2021 Thailand has been experiencing an unexpected Third Wave of Covid which has continued to cripple the local economy making an already bad situation even worse. By July 2021 funds were running dry and local people more desperate than ever. The Rotary Club continued its outreach and fundraising appeals both online and through our contacts in Rotary Worldwide.