Nelly introduced me to microcredit and savings groups in the towns of Tierra Blanca and San Jacinto that began in early 2009 and the Los Naranjos group that has three years of experience in microcredit.Upon arrival in the first town of Tierra Blanca, we were served a delicious breakfast that included the local delicacy, ‘Chicatana’ sauce, which is made of queen ants that only emerge at the beginning of the rainy season.Tierra Blanca is not entirely a coffee area. The community is located at 1400 meters above sea level, but many people have coffee bushes in the lowlands. During the morning we organized some activities to learn more about the strengths and challenges confronted by the savings group there.
“I feel happy that we have the microcredit group. With the credit I obtain, I can buy cheese in the next town and sell it here because we have no cheese in our community,” said Mrs. Valentina Pérez Herníndez, an outspoken and active woman. “We are just starting our group, but the earnings from the cheese help me care for my youngest son who is seven and my grandson who is five.”In the afternoon, we visited Los Naranjos where the experienced microcredit group was waiting for us. This group recently decided to create a butcher-shop in town with the savings they have accrued.Due to their remote location, a butcher only visits twice a month and the meat is not fresh. During the conversation I realized how FomCafé’s project not only provides participants with access to low-interest credit, but also promotes the teamwork and solidarity necessary to carry out new initiatives.
On the second day, our meeting in the village of San Jacinto was conducted in Spanish and Zapotec, a local indigenous language. Eight of the 12 participants only spoke Zapotec.Many of the women in this group are the heads of their households since most of their husbands have migrated or died. FomCafé’s work provides them with new opportunities for greater income and stability in their lives.My trip back to Oaxaca felt much different and the meetings I had reminded me of how it is possible to create with very little and how microcredit and saving initiatives can gradually change peoples’ lives.See more photos from our trip on Coffee Kids' Flickr page.To support this and similar programs in coffee-growing regions, please donate at http://www.coffeekids.org.
The new training center teaches by example. It was built using an environmentally-friendly compacted earth technique. Similar to adobe, it involves building molds and compacting dirt to form a solid wall. A water catchment system below the building collects rainfall in two large cisterns. The thick walls keep the building cool in the summer and warm when the temperature drops. CAMPO also has a number of demonstration projects to teach visitors from throughout the state of Oaxaca about organic gardening, permaculture, composting, fish farming, grey water treatment and bee keeping.Over 800 people attended the celebration. Before dinner was served, I gave a few words about the importance of CAMPO’s work and presented them with a certificate from Coffee Kids on behalf of all of our supporters to honor their work improving the quality of life in the entire region.
After dinner I ran into Pedro Osorio. We’d met a year earlier when Coffee Kids staff visited the community of Santa Cruz Tepetotutla, a far-flung community clinging to a mountainside in the Sierra Mixteca. He told me about their efforts to develop a new cooperative for coffee farmers in the area and a number of their efforts to diversify local income. When we last visited the community, they were working on a small eco-hotel for tourists. Santa Cruz is in the middle of a globally-important nature preserve and many in the community have learned the importance of conserving their natural resources and how it can be marketed to attract tourists. Hope I can get back there for a visit some day.After dinner, Jose Carlos Leon Vargas and Jose Luis Zarate from our Oaxaca office and I interviewed Eduardo Torres Navarrete, one of the founders of CAMPO. We had a great conversation and it’s easy to understand why CAMPO has been so effective over the past 20 years thanks to his leadership. I’ll be posting excerpts from our interview with him soon.Thanks to all of our supporters who have make the projects we support possible. These efforts are making a great difference. If you'd like to see more pictures from the event, 