Message from the Chairman, Nitya Pibulsonggram 

A New Cycle of Service to the Region 

I was delighted to return to the Kenan Institute Asia this year in time for the completion of the Institute’s first 12 years of work on sustainable development. In the Asian calendar, 12 years completes a cycle and in many ways K.I.Asia is now moving on to a new cycle of service to the region. 

In our early days, providing grants was the key benefit we provided, whether from our own endowment, from American Corporations for Thailand or from USAID. While we still design and manage sub-grants, our 12 years of experience has helped us develop a staff with strong development expertise that is now the key value we provide. In the past year, as you will see in this report, K.I.Asia’s experienced staff has provided a wide range of expertise that has included:

·         Facilitating the development of more competitive business clusters

·         Training new entrepreneurs in key business skills

·         Helping SME managers improve their business planning

·         Assisting communities, travel businesses and local governments work in concert to plan and implement strategies for “sustainable tourism”

·         Working with public health authorities and the private sector to combat emerging diseases such as multi-drug resistance malaria and avian influenza

·         Training teachers and communities to make more effective use of information technology and to take an “inquiry-based” approach to teaching science

·         Training corporate executives how to design, implement and evaluate corporate social responsibility programs

·         Conducting research aimed at improving business and economic policy 

In keeping with the broader regional mission objectives adopted by the Trustees in 2006, we have also developed the capability to provide assistance beyond Thailand’s borders. This year, K.I.Asia began working on a USAID program to help improve ASEAN’s competitiveness in key regional industries, starting with tourism and garments and textiles. Our staff helped the government of the Lao PDR develop plans for eco-tourism. In Vietnam, K.I.Asia managed three projects with the private sector and USAID to deal with avian influenza.  From my recent role as foreign minister, I cannot overemphasize just how important it is to build regional cooperation on development.