In the scattered hills of East Sumba, 5,300-litre ferrocement tanks collect each drop of rain. Families help build and maintain them. Children drink safely, and women no longer have to carry 20-kilo jerrycans for hours. Water near the house is a primary source of health care.
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Fair Future Foundation, a Swiss-based non-profit, is an innovative force in global healthcare and social aid.
Know your status, take an HIV test now – HIV prevention poster used by Kawan Sehat health agents.
We work in some of the most remote regions of Southeast Asia, where there are no doctors, no electricity, and often no clean water. For over sixteen years, Fair Future has been on the ground, creating long-term medical and social solutions with the communities who live here.
Through the Primary Medical Care programme, we treat wounds, infections, HIV, malaria, tuberculosis, and chronic illnesses directly in remote villages. With access to clean water, safe reservoirs, and nutritional support, communities can finally prevent disease rather than suffer from it.
Our approach is simple: stay close, listen, understand, and act with science and solidarity. Every action we take aims to strengthen families, improve health, and reduce preventable deaths.
Your support sustains this work. It transforms long days under the sun, muddy roads, and emergency care into measurable change for those who have nowhere else to turn. Alex Wettstein – Fair Future Foundation – Updated in November 2025
Help us provide medical care in places without doctors
Every franc you give funds direct medical care. Medicines, dressings, lab tests, and clean water systems that prevent children from getting sick. It also powers solar lights to keep vaccines cold and make nighttime care possible.
Explore our field work and medical reports
Search our articles, field stories, medical updates, and project reports from the ground
Stories from the Field
Real moments from our medical and humanitarian missions in ultra-rural Indonesia. Nothing arranged — just life, as we live it with them.
How your donations are used?
Fair Future directs 93% of every donated franc to field projects, including medical care, clean water systems, and malaria prevention. Full financial reports are published and audited annually
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Social and medical actions
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Fundraising work
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Field operations and management
WHAT WE ARE DOING NOW
Field stories of wounds treated, clean water built, and families protected
These articles are not reports — they are moments from the field. They show how we care for wound infections, bring clean water to villages, train health agents, and travel days to reach isolated families. This is the reality of our medical work.
Inventing toys when you don’t have any
This "Picture of the Day" shows two children from Tanah Mbanas, Sumba Tengah, who have created a kitchen with waste from the plastic they found around their houses made of earth and bamboo. They are playing cooking. Here, families do not have access to water and even less to clean water.
Here in Sumba, in these ultra-rural villages, it is not uncommon for children of all ages to invent toys and games from natural materials or objects from waste or old. In these areas, children rely on their creativity and ingenuity to find new forms of play and have fun.
For example, children can make their toys from natural materials such as sticks, pebbles and leaves. They can use these materials to create games like building forts or playing "tag" with modified rules. Likewise, old items like cans, tires, or ropes can be repurposed to create new toys, like a toy truck, makeshift soccer ball, or swing.
These types of imaginative play experiences are very beneficial for the development of children. They encourage creativity, problem-solving and social interaction as children work together to develop new ideas and adapt the rules of their games. Additionally, playing in nature can provide opportunities for physical activity and exploration, positively affecting physical and mental health.
Primary medical care dedicated to children
This "Picture of the Day" shows children who, thanks to the "Primary Medical Care" programme, learn to protect themselves against illness and injury through simple gestures and habits. Children in these regions do not have access to health centres, and no doctors are present in these villages (apart from those from the Fair Future and/or Kawan baik Indonesia foundations). It makes prevention an essential component of their health and well-being. Children in ultra-rural areas can significantly reduce their risk of illness or injury by incorporating simple habits and actions into their daily routines. In addition, it is essential to make children and parents aware of the importance of these habits and gestures so that they become part of their daily lives.
Giving primary medical care is not insignificant. It usually is doctors and nurses who do this. This is what makes this program unique in terms of innovation. Those who provide care, life-saving drugs and cures for Malaria, for example, are the teachers of this isolated village in eastern Indonesia. Therefore, for us here on site, it is essential to assess the impact and effectiveness of this program regularly. We carry out surveys, and we meet to collect medical data. We, therefore, highlight the areas where we can make the necessary changes. If this primary medical care program is a huge success, it is because it involves the communities in the various planning and implementation processes.
Teachers and parents of ill or injured children provide us with essential information. This 100% medical emergency program is in the process of success. It requires multiple collaborations, adequate ongoing training, sharing of supported cases and regular evaluation to ensure its safety, effectiveness and sustainability.
Malnutrition is taking its toll here where we are
This "Picture of the Day" shows children in East Sumba, where we are at work, as I post this Photo of the Day. Fair Future and Kawan Baik teams, as part of the #kawansehat #primarymedicalcare and #waterconnections projects, cook for children in the most rural and poor areas. In this image, some are drinking strawberry milk for the first time. They had never seen a straw before, and I remember all the kids asking us how to drink that kind of drink. We had to show them and help them plant the straw in the milk carton.
Malnutrition is an endemic problem here in all the rural villages of East Sumba. It is also the region with the highest rate of malnourished children in Indonesia. Here, clean water is absent from the houses, and the consumption of unclean water generates health problems and serious illnesses. And to cook, drink, and wash, you need water. And in order not to get sick, you also need water. Food production cannot occur without water, and families do not have enough income to buy food, rice and vegetables. On average, they live with less than two litres of water per person per day for everything: cooking, eating, drinking, drinking, bathing, going to the toilet and doing laundry. Have you ever tried?
Most children here are underweight and malnourished because they cannot eat enough. Meal frequency is one meal per day. Young children may be able to eat twice if all goes well. The menu will consist of rice and corn because more than rice alone is needed. In East Sumba, a kilo of rice costs three times more than in Java or Bali. Only a little salt and peppers accompany the meal to give flavour and taste.
We have a toilet for the first time in our life!
This "Picture of the Day" shows you an adorable couple from East Sumba, the village of #mbinudita -who are not used to being photographed-. Beneficiaries of the #waterconnections program who have had access to toilets at home for a few hours. But not only toilets: They can shower there, wash their clothes, and create a vegetable garden. And most importantly, eat and drink healthily. No more getting sick from the water. No more spending hours on the paths to fetch a few litres of dirty water.
East Sumba is one of the regions in the world with the highest rate of malnourished children. Infant mortality due to lack of clean water and toilets is staggering. Our medical teams still spend much of their time giving medical treatment and medicine to people and children who don't have clean water to swallow. Or how to treat a child who suffers from diarrhoea by giving him tablets that he will have to drink with inedible water, the source of his illness? Say to cook the water? It has no wood; frankly, when you're thirsty, you drink what's there.
But here, things have changed dramatically. Over thirty healthy sanitation facilities and over forty clean water tanks have been built for these almost 280 #rebuildmbinudita families. Every week we see new vegetable gardens created, many more children going to school, including young girls, and more mothers looking after their families instead of walking for hours to fetch five litres of dirty water.
When only dirty water remains to try to survive
This "Picture of the Day" shows some children looking slightly disappointed at the edge of the well, which contains no water. There are only 30 to 50 centimetres of water left. This water is black and dirty, and it will surely make them sick. But they will bring some back because, as the villagers often tell me: "When you're thirsty, you don't have time to boil water or find clean water. You're thirsty, so you drink this that there is …".
Having clean water heals people, improves families' health and reduces disease. Water is the best medicine in the world.
Here in Laindatang, the community, its inhabitants, and the families have always maximized the use of rainwater for cooking, eating, and drinking. Washing or doing laundry is done simultaneously: People wash their bodies with detergents directly at the water source. Linked to the lack of water, the villagers wash only once a month – with the related health consequences – or at best, every two weeks.
It should be noted that these families have never had sanitary facilities. Peeing and pooping are done behind a tree with all the health issues. For menstruating women, the lack of water makes this time very complicated.
A sanitary emergency: We invite you to support the urgent program in the village of Laindatang, East Sumba, which consists of giving water as quickly as possible via a deep borehole, two healthy sanitary installations and two/three water tanks 6,750-litres of water to these several hundred people. Click on the button bellow.
Kids here have to fetch water from the age of five!
This "Picture of the Day" shows you a five-year-old girl who, twice a day, descends the hill, steep and stony, without shoes to fetch water. She runs to go to the source, 500m away. Sometimes she falls, hurts herself, and comes back up with difficulty carrying a 5-litre jerrycan of not-so-clean water, which she and her friends have been looking for at the source.
In this village, like in many others here, people can only wash once a month, are all sick and don't have enough to eat and drink. Without access to this clean water, families – especially children – suffer from severe malnutrition, chronic respiratory and joint diseases and other illnesses linked to the consumption of dirty water and the absence of sanitation facilities. The fight against malaria, dengue fever and infectious diarrhoea also requires access to clean water and healthy water tanks. And to water that does not stagnate but circulates between the installations.
As we have already said, East Sumba is the poorest province in Southeast Asia, the region with the highest child malnutrition and associated mortality. Fait Future, therefore, wishes to act for these hundreds of people and give them access to clean and healthy water for their health.
East Sumba, a village without clean water!
This "Picture of the Day" shows you a thrilled woman because when we last visited the "Water Connections – Laindatang" Project site, we brought – thanks to the Truck of Life – several jerry cans filled with drinking water, or about one hundred litres. So everyone is scrambling to get a little. We shared this water with the villagers.
The Water Connections project, Laindatang Site, is one for which we also seek help. Laindatang is a village without drinking water. People only wash once a month, are sick and don't have enough to eat and drink. All children are underweight, and so are adults. We must act for these hundreds of people and give them access to drinking water. The project consists of drilling a deep borehole, building healthy sanitary facilities and two clean water storage tanks, of the ferro-cement type, with a capacity of 6,500 litres each.
Here Malaria, Dengue fever and infectious diarrhoea linked to the problems of contaminated water are wreaking havoc. After carrying out the feasibility studies, we are now ready to implement this project this month. Indeed, we are on the site now and would like to start this necessary project for the hundreds of people suffering from a lack of water in the region.
Water Connections project in Laindatang
The Water Connections project, Laindatang Site, is our current top priority. Laindatang is a village without water. Everyone is sick and does not have enough to eat and drink. Children are underweight, and so are adults. We must act for these hundreds of people and give them access to clean water. Here, malaria, dengue fever and infectious diarrhoea linked to contaminated water problems are taking their toll. After completing the feasibility studies, we are ready to implement this project this month. Indeed, we are there now and wish to start this necessary project for the hundreds of people suffering from the lack of water in the region.
Our 2024 Impact in Remote Villages
These figures reflect real patients, real treatments, and real kilometres crossed to bring care where no doctor is available.
Medical consultations delivered in ultra-rural villages where no doctor, no clinic, and no alternative care exists.
Litres of safe water storage built or funded, allowing families to drink, cook, and wash without risking disease.
People reached through daily health education on hygiene, malaria prevention, clean water, and basic nutrition.
Children who can now study, read, and move safely after dark thanks to clean, reliable solar light in their homes and schools.
2024 Annual Report – 15 Years of Concrete Action
Discover Fair Future’s 2024 Annual Report—a compelling testament to our work in East Sumba, from primary healthcare and access to clean water to nutrition and education programmes. This year marked our 15th anniversary, a significant milestone in resilience, impact, and innovation. The full report, available in both French and English, reflects the lives we have touched and the urgent challenges that lie ahead.
Keep in Touch via Instagram
Real moments from our medical, water, and community missions in ultra-rural Indonesia. Nothing staged — just the daily reality of our work on the ground.
One story that explains our work
A story you shouldn’t skip
Climate change is no longer tomorrow’s problem. In East Indonesia, it already shapes daily illness, hunger, and water scarcity.
Our core programmes in ultra rural Indonesia
We work in the extreme east of Indonesia, in ultra rural villages with no doctors, no electricity, and often no clean water. These programmes turn medical knowledge, community effort, and solidarity into concrete solutions for families who live far from any form of care.
Primary Medical Care
Water Connections
Kawan Against Malaria
