Dear Friends,
Thank you for the many calls and emails asking how our programs are holding up in the wake of recent storms Dean and Felix. We have passed your messages and best wishes along to our field trainers in Central America, and they have told us that it really means a great deal to know that friends far away are thinking of them during times of hardship.
Sadly, there was some storm damage in Honduras, Nicaragua and Belize. Jacobo Suazo, our field trainer working in the municipality of Nueva Frontera, Honduras reports that in the village of Terreritos, approximately 21 acres of corn were destroyed by wind damage. Most of this corn was financed by the rural bank that SHI established in the community. The bank is currently at risk as families who lost their corn will be unable to repay the loans without a harvest. In the village of San Miguelito, SHI families lost approximately 35 acres of beans due to heavy rains.
Belize and Nicaragua also experienced heavy rains, winds and some flooding which has made it very difficult for our local staff to reach the families they serve. SHI Belize Field Trainer, Robert Chavarria, wrote to say, "With all the rain it gets difficult to get to some of my participant families, especially in Boom Creek. Whatever the case, I know the work is important and we are doing our best." SHI Belize Director, Nana Mensah, reported that Hurricane Dean destroyed Belize's papaya crop which has left many plantation workers without work. SHI is working with families to recover from these difficulties. Donations have been requested by our field programs to purchase needed seeds, materials and to support rural bank programs in all four countries (click here to donate online and support these efforts).
Despite these recent hardships, we feel lucky. Sustainable Harvest Honduras Field Trainer, Juan Carlos Sandres tells us that SHI is not in the business of disaster relief, but disaster prevention - and it's working! In his own words, "After the experience of devastation in my country from Hurricane Mitch in 1998, Sustainable Harvest Honduras has been dedicated to sharing agro-forestry techniques with families that were impacted by the disaster. We have been able to improve many vulnerable areas through soil conservation, reforestation, crop diversification and disaster prevention training. We know that when there are natural disasters, the families we work with are more resilient and their parcels of land are much less susceptible to erosion and crop loss."
In addition to restoring watershed areas and holding soil in place which prevents devastating mudslides and flash floods, SHI's work offsets global climate change. A recent report in Nature concludes that hurricanes have become stronger and longer lasting over the past 30 years which scientists on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change link to increased carbon in the atmosphere. For a hurricane to occur, ocean heat is necessary, and global warming is arguably one of the causes of a trend of increasing ocean temperatures around the world. Global warming is a massive, international problem, but SHI is working at the local level to affect global change.
With your support, SHI is making large strides by implementing techniques that offset climate change while combating poverty. Many of SHI's practices, like wood-conserving stoves, work to reduce carbon emissions. These stoves use a small fraction of the amount of wood as an open fireplace and greatly reduce toxic smoke in the home. As SHI continuously works to prevent slash-and-burn farming, it simultaneously works to lower carbon emissions. When large amounts of land are burned, the change in land-use may cause the carbon sink to be reduced in size, and this in turn increases carbon dioxide in the atmosphere - contributing to global warming. Therefore, SHI's work to stop slash-and-burn farming is also work to stop climate change and prevent severe hurricane damage.
Thank you for all your support of Sustainable Harvest International as we work to improve the quality of life of the families in Central America and the global community.
Maine Students Help in HondurasA recent article in the Lincoln County News featured Smaller World Trip participants Sean Kennedy and Derek Bascom. The two high school students from mid-coast Maine said they learned that people in Honduras aren't really that different from people back home and it felt good to do things that make a difference in people's lives. Click here to read the full article and see other recent news items featuring SHI. |
New Year's in BelizeRing in the New Year with a special trip to Sustainable Harvest International's Belize program. Activities will include a wood-conserving stove and oven workshop, tours of family farms and making chocolate from sustainably grown cacao. Space is limited. For more information, please contact Smaller World Trip Coordinator, Steven Swierenga at 919-975-5254. |
Get a Sneak Peak of the SHI Documentary!
If the video dosen't appear here in your browser, click here to view on YouTube.
Special thanks to Myriad Media for all their work on this project!
Take a Minute to Help SHI Win $10,000
SHI has created two groups on a new social networking site and will be eligible to win $10,000 if we can get 100 people to join our online groups. It is free, easy and will not lead to any unwanted mailings. $10,000 could allow SHI to begin work in at least 3 new villages, reaching many more Central American families that are anxiously waiting for our help. Please take a moment to join today and encourage others to do the same.
Register at http://beta.razoo.com and join our groups at http://beta.razoo.com/groups/shi and http://beta.razoo.com/groups/sw. Then make sure to tell everyone you know how to join each of these groups!
As always, thank you for your support. We'll see you on Razoo!
If you'd like to join SHI's other online groups, check out these: Myspace, Flickr and Facebook.
Wood-conserving Stove Demonstration in San Ignacio
I was lucky to be in San Ignacio in the Cayo district of Belize, near the Guatemalan border, on August 8th. There I met with Nana Mensah, the Belize Director for Sustainable Harvest International, at the Mana Kai campground near the marketplace. Nana had been invited there with a small crew from the Toledo district to demonstrate the construction of a very efficient, easy-to-build wood-conserving stove and oven. Click here to read the full article.
DC and San Francisco Green Festivals
Join SHI this fall at the Green Festival! We'll be in Washington DC October 6th and 7th and then in San Francisco November 9th, 10th and 11th. Passes are available for volunteers, and we would love to see you there! If you're interested in volunteering at the SHI Booth, please click here to contact our office. For general information on the event, click here.
A Special Request
Do you work for Palm or know anyone who does? If so, please contact us ASAP so we can talk to you about how you can help us cut the cost of our new field program monitoring system.
Sustainable Harvest International • 779 North Bend Rd. Surry, ME 04684 • 207.669.8254 (phone) • 866.683.6594 (toll free) • 207.669.8255 (fax) • shi@sustainableharvest.org • www.sustainableharvest.org
Smaller World: Reg. U.S. Pat. & T.M. Off