social enterprise
Weaving Co-Ops in Rural Guatemala
One of the most interesting aspects of my GCY experience is the opportunity to periodically shadow Yoli and Clara. These resourceful Guatemalan women are two of the owners of SOLCOM, the small Guatemalan-owned social enterprise that turns a mild profit by delivering healthcare products to rural communities. Recently, Yoli, Clara and I were scheduled to leave on a campaign to sell eyeglasses. We planned to leave at 9:00 a.m. so I showed up at 8:30. It turned out that Yoli and Clara had other important things to do, so we didn’t actually depart until 10:30. That’s life in Guatemala for you! As we left, we joked because Clara grabbed a very ugly pair of protectoras, which are glasses with a UV covering that protect from sun and dust. She put them back, saying in Spanish, “If people saw those, nobody would come to the campaign on Thursday to buy our glasses!”
On the way to Santiago Zamora, we traveled through San Antonio Aguas Calientes, a small town which serves as a transportation hub. I soon learned that the only way to Santiago is by tuc-tuc, a small motorized rickshaw.
There are no busses to Santigo because the community is too small. After pulling out in our tuc-tuc, we entered the most enchanting drive on a stone-paved winding road through coffee plantations and pastures until we reached Santiago Zamora twenty five minutes later. Yoli and Clara had told me that we were traveling to one of the most beautiful places they had ever seen. I believed them, but could not have imagined how beautiful it would be without seeing it with my own eyes!
When we began our publicity for the campaign, I began to stretch my definition of “rural”. Yoli and Clara had described Santiago Zamora as a rural town and I had expected to find a town festering in squalor. Instead, I found a small, quaint town with only about a thousand people, with nicely paved roads and lots of cement homes with doorbells. Nobody owned cars, but they seemed to live pretty well in Santiago. Doña Yoli attributed this to the creation of several weaving co-ops a dozen years or so ago, which have significantly boosted the mothers’ incomes and increased their abilities to provide for their families.
For me, the weaving co-ops in Santiago provided a great example of the positive impact of sustainable development work. I found it very encouraging to see how a small town such as Santiago Zamora has created a new life for itself, while maintaining its rural charm.
Finding Their Voice
On Friday and Saturday, the Antigua fellows and Ximena went on a combination vision campaign/ training session with Yoly (Marguerite‘s host-mom) and Clara Luz, two regional coordinators at Soluciones Comunitarias.
The training of the new “asesoras” (community “advisors”, or women entrepreneurs) began on Friday. We were trying to fit the training all into one day because traveling to Conguaco is a long and expensive trip. When we arrived the women were already waiting, but as the training began I saw something that worried me. It worried Yoly and Clara too. And what was this worrisome thing? Utter silence. Silence on the part of the eight women that Yoly & Clara had come to train; Silence that really got in the way of teaching them to give eye exams and explain about products, that got in the way of them even expressing their thoughts or questions. They wouldn’t make eye contact, wouldn’t even raise their hands when Clara asked “Who is interested in becoming an asesora?” I don’t think I’ve ever seen such timidness in grown women, much less eight grown women who had already agreed to dedicate an entire day to this training. As I said before… things did not bode well. › Continue reading
Coffee in Guatemala
Of all the possible skills I thought I might be able to learn while living in Guatemala, using an espresso machine never ranked very high. But that is where expectations could be deceiving.
Helen, another volunteer with Soluciones Comunitarias in Nebaj, brought a small espresso machine back from the States so that El Descanso, a small restaurant and favorite hangout place of gringos passing through town, could improve its coffee options (currently, they fill a big container of instant coffee).What better way to get tourists to stay in Nebaj a little longer and put more money into the local economy than by offering quality coffee – there’s no shortage of it growing here.That said, the majority of the highest quality coffee is sent directly for export. So, needless to say, the first three blends we’ve experimented with have come out less than ideal. But, we’re still hopeful to find something incredible and then teach the meseros in the restaurant how to make our favorite lattes, cappuccinos, and espressos.So, even if the coffee we’ve made has been less than superb, Shreya (another volunteer, pictured) and I are already stellar espresso machine users. Ultra important life skills for the win.
Perroquia/Las Pacayas
One of our major projects in Guatemala is to support Soluciones Comunitarias, an NGO which trains Guatemalans to sell health related products such as reading glasses, water purifiers, and vegetable seeds. This week, we spent two (long) days traveling around northern Quiche and I produced the following video to document our journey:
Más Mani porfavor (More peanut butter please)
As time evolves so does the peanut butter project “Más Mani porfavor“. This week we made about 5 jars which 4 of them were sold for 22 quetzales (about 3 U.S dollars). Out of those 22 quetzales 2 are giving back if the jar is returned. It is incredibly exciting to see things moving along.
For right now our principal customer is the Restaurant “El Descanso” where Shreya (another volunteer at Soluciones Comunitarias) has made veggie Burgers, chow mei and a banana shake with our Peanut butter being the main ingredient. People have been buying all these new plates at the restaurant which is a sign of success for now. Today we had a meeting with our first entrepreneur from the aldea “La Pista” where the Centro Explorativo (our center point) is located. On Saturday we will be giving him a few jars. One of the jars will be a sample for people to try and the other ones are to sell. Our hope is to find other responsible young men (13 to 15 years old) to be entrepreneurs of our project “Más Mani Porfavor”. The entrepreneurs will be enroll at the community center and will be paid 3 quetzales per jar (about 36 U.S cents) which for Guatemalan standards is a fair price. Our final goal is to be able to make these project sustainable. Hopefully everything will work out!
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