Author name: admin

This is a note from Cory Wilcox from the U.S. Consulate in Guayaquil. If you would like to be put in touch with him directly, send and email to us at Friends of Ecuador and we will put you in touch. 

The American Citizen Services Unit at the U.S. Consulate General in Guayaquil is working to expand its network of Consular Liaison Volunteers in areas where we currently have limited coverage.

We are specifically seeking U.S. citizens who live or work in the following provinces:

• El Oro, particularly Machala and surrounding communities
• Los Ríos, particularly Babahoyo and Quevedo
• Cañar, particularly Azogues and surrounding communities

Consular Liaison Volunteers serve as local points of contact between the U.S. Consulate and the American citizen community. They help distribute official safety and emergency information, provide the Consulate with local situational awareness, and support communication with

American citizens during emergencies. The position is voluntary and does not involve providing consular services or acting on behalf of the U.S. government.

Given Friends of Ecuador’s extensive network of returned Peace Corps Volunteers and others with longstanding ties throughout the country, I am writing to ask whether you know any U.S. citizens currently living or working in these areas who might be interested in serving.

Please feel free to forward this message through your network. To protect individuals’ privacy, you may also ask interested persons to contact me directly rather than sharing their information without permission.

If you are soccer fans like us, you had high hopes for Ecuador “LaTri” going in to the World Cup. They had a formidable defense with some globally recognized players like Enner Valencia and Piero Hincapié. In the qualifying rounds, they struggled tying tiny Curacao 0-0 and losing to the Ivory Coast 1-0. With a plucky 2-1 victory over Germany, though, they made it out of the group stage, only to lose to Mexico 2-0 and crashing out of the tournament. They really struggled to score throughout the tournament, with the manger resigning, right after the tournament ended.

Here is hoping that they have a better tournament in 2030!

I am writing to the membership of Friends of Ecuador to express our deep gratitude for the support you have continued to show the Association Mushuk Yuyay in its efforts to achieve food sovereignty and economic stability in southern Ecuador.

Preparations for the IX World Quinua Congress and VI Andean Grains Symposium are moving along steadily. Transportation, housing, food details are finalized, as well as collaborations with local, provincial, and national government entities and various universities. Businesses and NGOs are also on board for a successful Congress followed by a Feria featuring several business enterprises along with Mushuk Yuyay. These are things beyond our dreams when we were in Peace Corps.

Here is a bit more information on the organization.

MUSHUK YUYAY: COMMUNITY LED, INDIGENOUS EFFORTS IN THE ANDES MOUNTAINS
For thousands of years, the indigenous people of the Andes mountains of southern Ecuador (the Kañari) have been growing, tending, and harvesting quinoa, amaranth, and other native grains. They have been cultivating a great many varieties of potatoes and other tubers along with squashes, vegetables, and fruit. In the face of centuries of colonialism and imperialism, the Kañari have managed to hold on to their traditional ways of caring for the earth, and feeding each other. But that does not mean their path has been an easy one; they have faced immeasurable adversity and hardship.

In the indigenous Kichwa (Quechua) language, Mushuk Yuyay means “New Thought,” and the initiative certainly lives up to its name. The Association of Producers of Seeds and Nutritious Andean Foods Mushuk Yuyay was established by Nicolás Pichazaca in 1994 to help local smallholder farmers with seed and organic inputs at a time when the farmers were struggling to survive. Since then, they have established a name brand for their products, Alli Mikuna (“Good Food”), and built a processing plant. Mushuk Yuyay sees their purpose as to holistically work with indigenous farmers to build a stable economy with food sovereignty, food security, and food justice.

According to the initiative, the needs of their community around health, food, and money,
coupled with the battle against climate change cannot be solved with one solution. As a result, they approach existing environmental, health, and economic challenges with a holistic array of programs. These include feeding and nutrition education through their Healthy Children and Healthy Future school program; ecosystem restoration through the Restorative Forest of Guyaraloma; paying farmers fair market prices in the field at harvest; community education programs with NGOs and public agencies; irrigation projects involving the area in which they operate; participatory research with universities; developing organic fertilizers and pest control with the farmers; seed selection and improvement for increased biodiversity; expanding cultivation through developing community savings and loan groups; and finally, marketing by developing their own brand, Alli Mikuna, and building a processing center.

From a current US citizen living in Ecuador, Friends of Ecuador was made aware of a fundraiser for a special needs child named Nico in Ecuador who has some health needs. There is a GoFundMe set up for Nico. The information below is from the GoFundMe page. Thus far, they’ve raised nearly $5k of the overall $12k goal.