Projects

For many years, Hans Gotz worked as a development worker in Ecuador. In the late 1990s, he worked with Friends of Ecuador president Josh Busby on organic quinoa export to the United States. He’s now working in Zambia with Bread for the World on a community project and is seeking help to support community projects there. This is a guest post from Hans.

We urgently need water in the Chilobwe community in Kalulushi, Zambia, Africa.

• A borehole with a 55m liner costs 2300USD + hand pump 450USD + installation and materials about 200USD.
• In the second phase we would like to install a solar pump with batteries and an elevated tank.

Please let me tell you about that:
We have decided to finish my cycle of work as I started as a development worker, now with Bread for the World. For the past year we have been working with Adriana here in Zambia at the Mindolo Ecumenical Foundation (MEF), a very well-known institution in Zambia and Africa for its 65 years of training and capacity building in many different areas.

Due to the needs of the people (at the moment there is a terrible famine due to the worst drought in many decades) they have decided to expand the training to include sustainable, resilient agriculture. We have a training farm where 60 students are currently living and working. To implement this training and to develop the training farm, Bread for the World sent me (similar to my work with Escuelas Radiofonicas del Ecuador (ERPE).

MEF gave 117 families 3 hectares of land each, thinking they could improve their living conditions, but the people don’t know anything about farming, they burn to plant a little maize in monoculture and mainly cut down all the trees/bushes to make charcol for sale. Most of them only eat once a day, they have to walk long distances to fetch water, the school is far away.

This is my third line of action with MEF to help this community develop. We are training the young people on the farm, some friends from Germany are funding a trainer to live in the community, work with the people and build a model house with his wife and child. We have 3ha of community land where we have started to develop a community centre.

We have dug a 15m hand well but unfortunately it has dried up, digging deeper is too dangerous or requires a high investment in casing.

We did a technical study with experts and found another spot in the communal area where we should see abundant water, ideal for the borehole.

The community is very committed to the work, they have made more than 3000 bricks by hand for the trainer’s house, and they are working hard with him in the field, preparing for the planting of the new PFUMVUDZA or family plots system, because we must plant before 25.11.2024.

But we need water, we need the watering hole!

Please help us raise funds. A GoFundMe page has been set up here with the appeal for support. Please help if you can!

If you have questions about the project, feel free to reach out to Hans directly via email.

 

This is a guest post from Alan Adams, Asesor Internacional, Mushuk Yuyay

Last spring, we posted a story on Mushuk Yuyay and our efforts to fundraise to support them. We only raised about $100. Please consider a donation. We’re hoping to raise at least $1500 to support a Field Day showing off the Mushuk Yuyay experimental farm and all of the crops available there. If you like to donate to Mushuk via Friends, you can visit Friends of Ecuador’s Donate page and PayPal link.

Mushuk Yuyay in Cañar, Ecuador will host the IX World Quinua Congress on June 17, 18, 19 & 20 of 2025 to coincide with the Inti Raymi celebration. This will be the biggest event in the history of Cañar with universities, NGOs, businesses, government agencies, marketers and tourists participating. Musicians, artists, dancers, performers of every kind will make the festivities bright and exciting. There will be new and traditional foods, including quinua pasta, quinua and amaranth bread, amaranth energy bars, and much more besides the foods that Returned Peace Corps Volunteers remember and love about the Sierra. This will also be a community event featuring the farmers and local crafters, but most of all, you will see the astounding transformation that the people themselves have brought about over the past few decades.

Mushuk Yuyay would like Friends of Ecuador to be an essential part of this World Quinua Congress by helping to sponsor a vital component of the program. Over the years, Friends of Ecuador has helped Mushuk Yuyay while the association was struggling to stay alive. Now Mushuk Yuyay is a growing economic and social force in southern Ecuador. Now, we are hoping that Friends of Ecuador will be put their name on the Field Day at the Mushuk Yuyay experimental farm, Finca La Posta, to demonstrate the advances in agroecological cultivation of quinua and other crops for the health and stability of the region. It is projected that 350 attendees will participate in this activity. The total cost of this event will be $2,100. We are asking Friends of Ecuador to provide just half, $1,500, by the end of 2024, to make the Field Day possible.

I am always available to answer any questions. Please check Mushuk Yuyay out at MushukYuyay.org or Associación Mushuk Yuyay on Facebook.

 

This is a guest post from RPCV Dave Goucher, founder of Conciencia Amazónica.

In the province of Morona Santiago, more than 1000 species of birds have been observed and recorded on eBird (a database managed by Cornell University), representing more than half of the total species of birds in the entire country of Ecuador.  Throughout the last 50 years, on a global level, the observation of birds (known as “birding”) has become a tourism phenomenon, with the positive result of impulsing conservation of habitats to maintain and recuperate forests across the world.  In Ecuador, eco-tourism has been an important source of income specifically to the Galapagos Islands, but  over the last decade, adventurous tourists have made the most rural reaches of the Amazon their destinations to enjoy little explored areas.

CONCIENCIA AMAZÓNICA has made environmental education a primary goal of its foundation projects, using birding as an activity to captivate the younger generations.  Almost every child in any school in the province has a family member who owns a farm, primarily used for cattle production using non-sustainable, non-environmentally friendly ancestral practices.  While cattle production represents over half of the main source of income of the population, applying new methods and a new business model, model farms in San Juan Bosco are presented to demonstrate that an equilibrium between production and conservation is possible.  Visits to these farms include a detailed explanation of the processes undertaken to change pastures, improve beef genetics, as well as the “produce the best” business model, all while maintaining streams clean with natural reforestation, and the resulting re-establishment of flora and fauna.  A farm visit also entails observation of birds, insects, and any other creature encountered while walking the property, demonstrating first hand the abundance of biodiversity adjacent to cattle, as well as emphasizing the eco-tourism aspect of the farm, a sustainable and even profitable, alternative income generating activity.

Several videos have been produced based on resulting videos of wildlife cameras, completing the visit with the demonstration of an entire trophic chain reestablished in areas of conservation in just 10 years, including 2 natural corridors, reconnecting 2 previously isolated tracts of primary forest, to a much larger area of rainforest, allowing for repopulation of such animals as the South American Cougar (Puma concolor), the Mountain Tapir (Tapirus pinchaque), the Collared Peccary (Dicotyles tajacu), and even the rare Northern Pudu (Pudu mephistophiles).

Thanks to Jack and James Agett (RPCV, Ecuador 1966), a new Nature Preserve, Agett-Geary Nature Preserve, has been purchased, currently encompassing 2 cattle farms, forming 300 hectares (750 acres).  The Nature Preserve will be legally declared a Private Reserve and Bird Sanctuary following an extensive biodiversity assessment across the vast property, which ranges in altitude 3800 ft to over 10,000 ft above sea-level; at these altitudes, we expect to observe the rare Spectacled Bear, the only bear species in South America.  This area will be transformed into a large scale, model project of conservation, area of continual scientific study, and an ecotourism destination in the rural Amazon region of Ecuador.

FRIENDS OF ECUADOR has been an essential collaborator with Conciencia Amazonica; since 2020 during the pandemic, funds were raised in the US to assist isolated Amazon communities with essential food supplies, as well as seeds for producing familiar gardens.  Since then, our collaborations have resulted in 6 figure annual donations for community projects, environmental education, scientific investigations, as well as the Agett-Geary Nature Preserve.  Our areas of work have expanded now into 6 of the 12 counties in the Morona Santiago Province.

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This is an update on the Mushuk Yuyay school feeding program that FOE supported last year.

The FOE funds were to be used in 3 schools.  400 children were provided with breakfasts and participated in the educational activities.

The program will last through June 2017 due to the assistance of FOE donations. Below is a recent video and some photos from the project.

Objectives 

The Healthy Children, Healthy Futures Program is working with several indigenous Cañaris community schools for the purposes of:

• Learning the value of nutritious traditional food such as quinoa and amaranth.  For example, one cup (2.4 dl, 245 g) of cooked amaranth grain (from about 65 g raw) provides 251 calories and is an excellent source (20% or more of the Daily Value, DV) of protein, dietary fiber, and some dietary minerals.  Amaranth is particularly rich in manganese (105% DV), magnesium (40% DV), iron (29% DV), and selenium (20% DV.) Also cooked amaranth leaves are an excellent source of vitamin A, vitamin C, calcium, manganese, and foliate. Other home grown crops are barley.
• Learning how to prepare and serve the foods such as barley or quinoa soup, amaranth, preparation of quimbolitos (traditional Ecuadorian pastries) made of corn flour and wrapped in achira leaves (ancient Andean crop plant with edible leaves).
• Learning how to plant these traditional foods through the use of demonstration plots.

Picture Album:

We are proud to partner with the Association of Producers of Seeds and Nutritional Andean Foods on a pilot school feeding program in the Cañar region for which we are requesting donations on their behalf. This has come to our attention from RPCVs Stuart Moskowitz and Alan Adams (Ecuador 1967-69). We are seeking to mobilize $1000 to support a fall program. Read on for full details about the project.

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Mushuk Yuyay School Breakfast AppealRead More »

From the project’s website:

Mujeres Cambia (Women Are Changing) is a social venture located in Ecuador whose mission is to provide opportunities for low-income women to benefit themselves and the environment through making and selling products made of recycled materials.

Mujeres Cambia members work towards change within their families, their community, and the world. All products are made by hand out of recycled materials and are priced to ensure that each artist is paid a fair wage.

Living in the coastal fishing villages of Santa Elena, Ecuador members come together to support one another working towards individual goals each member has set for herself. Mujeres Cambia gives women the opportunity to share their creativity outside of the home, to promote eco-friendly practices, and to earn money for their families.

How It was Started

Again, from the project website:

Mujeres Cambia was founded in 2011 by a Peace Corps Volunteer named Jessica who taught recycled arts projects to women in San Pablo. The founding group of women: Jennifer, Elba, Noralma, Alexandra, and Maribel opened up membership when new Peace Corps Volunteers Marisa and Paul started working with the group after Jessica’s Close of Service.
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Volunteer jewelry projectRead More »

This is a note from RPCV Miles Masci who is seeking to help another ambitious youth further their education in Ecuador. Any ideas for him would be most welcome.

A family I was very close to in Ecuador has a very ambitious son who recently matriculated at ESPOL Naval Academy in Guayaquil. The family is now struggling to find the financing to allow him this education he has worked so hard on. I was wondering (beyond self financing) what may be some resources I could use or direct them to? Any ideas? Thanks

mightymiles@gmail.com

This is a guest post by Katrina Organ, a recent RPCV from Ecuador. She has started a scholarship fund for her host sister.

Hey Folks! Over the summer as I was finishing my Peace Corps service, I decided to start a scholarship for my Ecuadorian host sister. She is an exceptional kid limited by her family’s economic situation.. you can read more about it on the website. If you can donate, I would really appreciate it, and so would Estefania. Either way, please, SHARE the website! The more people know about the scholarship, the more likely we are to get donations! I REALLY need to get the word out right now. Please share on your facebook, and share via email with friends, co-workers, and family members if you can. THANKS and let me know if you have any questions or suggestions for fundraising!