22 NON-RAMP ACTIVITIES
GROUND HANDLING INTERNATIONAL APRIL 2013
Giving back
The third annual BFS Cargo Awards Gala Dinner was held recently in Bangkok and on the agenda was an item a little out of the ordinary, as Tim Ornellas reports.
am not sure that Ground Handling International has ever led off an article with a picture of happy dancing
children before - so perhaps you are wondering about the relevance of this picture in terms of today’s handling industry?
How often have you peered out of
David Ambridge brings the audience up to date with progress on the day centre programme
the aircraft window on final approach to your destination airport in Asia and spotted a slum area or shanty town abutting the airport perimeter fence? It is a reminder that when sometimes we complain about how tough life is, there is always somebody a lot worse off. Next time you fly into Bangkok you may notice a very large rubbish dump. This dump is On Nut and is, in fact, the largest rubbish dump in Thailand and occupies over 230 acres or 94 hectares. More than that, it is actually home to around 200 families that live in makeshift shelters that sit on the rubbish.
(L to r) Stewart Sinclair, MD Bangkok Flight Services; Jitrapa Himathongkam, Secretary of the Foundation for Slum Child Care; David Ambridge, General Manager BFS Cargo; Dr Juree Vichit-Vadakan, President of the Foundation for Slum Child Care; Somruthai Prasarttong-osoth, Marketing Director, Bangkok Flight Services; Captain Puttipong Prasarttong-osoth, President Bangkok Airways; Khun Thavatvong, Chairman of Bangkok Flight Services and Senior EVP Finance of Bangkok Airways and Barry Nassberg, EVP and COO of Worldwide Flight Services
For us, it is hard to imagine living in these conditions which is why, in 2010, David Ambridge, Bangkok Flight Services General Manager of Cargo, and his BFS team decided to try to improve the lives of those 200 families by organising an auction and raffle as part of the BFS Annual Cargo Awards Gala Dinner. His idea was that the entire proceeds would be donated to the Foundation for Slum Child Care (FSCC) that delivers a support service for slum children. This foundation currently provides
day care support at three day centres for around 80 children that live on the
On Nut rubbish dump. These children benefit from a clean environment, food and valuable play time away from the rubbish.
In 2011, the BFS event raised Thai Baht 1m and David and his team then decided to set a target to raise enough money to build a new day care centre for these deprived children. The following year, a staggering Thai Baht 4.3m was raised, which enabled the foundation to purchase land close to On Nut where a new day centre could be built.
In February, the third annual event raised even more than the previous year, Thai Baht 4.5m, which means that the industry supporters and BFS have together raised just under Thai Baht 10m in the space of just three years. This is a remarkable achievement and the corporate responsibility shown by BFS and its supporters is an example to the aviation community around the world of the importance of giving back; it is not the only such initiative, either. BFS is a subsidiary of WFS and WFS is also heavily involved in other parts of the world with similar initiatives.”
The construction of the new day centre will begin very soon and it is expected to be open within the next 12 months. This has been thanks to the generosity of the architectural and construction company World PM that has offered to help with the planning and building of the centre free of charge.
In between the fund raising, BFS
presented cargo awards to selected airlines and freight forwarders and inaugurated two new individuals into their Cargo Hall of Fame: these were Khun Yuttana Yimgarund, Deputy Director for Administration, Bangkok Customs Department and Chris Notter, VP Cargo Operations, Qatar Airways.
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