Archdiocesan agency helps Thais scavenging at Bangkok garbage dump

Published: 2004-08-05

BANGKOK, Thailand (CNS) -- The Bangkok Archdiocese's social action center has helped people who scavenge at a city garbage dump improve their quality of life and build a community spirit. Chun and Mon, a married couple who rummage through four-story-high mounds of garbage at the dump in Nongkhaem, on Bangkok's outskirts, said their community now has tap water, electricity and roads thanks to the church program. Their remarks were reported by UCA News, an Asian church news agency based in Thailand. "In the past, people just lived for themselves, but today there is more unity among slum people," Mon said. The two are among 1,000 people of 170 households of squatters in the slum in the westernmost part of the capital. Many people there arrived about 20 years ago from Isaan, Thailand's impoverished northeastern region, looking for jobs. They ended up at Nongkhaem to rummage and sell recyclable material such as copper, aluminum, paper, and plastic or glass bottles dumped daily by trucks on the six-acre site.

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