About our work

Stanford University’s Center for social innovation defines it as “the process of developing and deploying effective solutions to challenging and often systemic social and environmental issues in support of social progress” (link). Over the past ten years, Community First has engineered such solutions in the fields of water & agriculture, education and the creation and development of many local businesses.

And throughout its ten years as an international development organization, Community First has always had social innovation as its driving force. Combined with a youthful multidisciplinary team on the field, this gave rise to many life-changing and sustainable local solutions to the global problems of poverty.

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More on our programs

Aquaponics

Education

R&D

People-Driven Ideas & Process

High Social Impact

All Community First initiatives in Sen Sok have been developed in close collaboration with the villagers using a Participatory Rural Appraisal methodology. Over the course of a year and a half, women, men, children and the elderly attended focus group discussions and workshops to help them define what their community needed to thrive. Our programs are the results of this process.

Working in a place like Sen Sok, where there are so little resources to rely on makes for a fascinating challenge. But more importantly, it ensures that every successful project changes the world of the people benefiting from it. Food security and other global issues can have a dire impact in places like Cambodia, and that is precisely why Community First's very first campus and R&D Center is located there, in the middle of the rice fields.

Highlights from the blog

Pierre Mainguy & Romain Rak Nominated for a Rotary Humanitarian STAR Award

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News the Farm School: ​New family builds and brand new concrete fish tanks with a window!

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Our family aquaponic system is on display at the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical  Gardens!

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