The sun is shining once again over El Salvador after October’s devastating rains. The land is beginning to dry, and people have returned to their communities to begin the clean-up effort. President Mauricio Funes reported this week that the storm caused about $840 million worth of damages.
When the “medical brigade” from ANADES (our partner Salvadorian NGO) invited me to join them at 6:00 am next morning for a trip to Bajo Lempa, it didn’t take too long for me to say, “yes.” I was curious to know how the rebuilding efforts was taking place in one of the most affected areas of the country. In the Bajo Lempa, the low-lying farming area near the Lempa River, the communities were completely flooded, destroying most crops. Even though most people have lived through floods before – something more and more common due to climate change – the situation there is extremely difficult. When we arrived at the school Armando Lopez around 9:00 am, there were already around forty families waiting for the doctor, a natural medicine expert, a medical student, and three volunteers coming with us.
There were heavy floods in the three pre-school communities
we visited— Amando Lopez, Presidio Liberado, and La Canoa.
Children Can't Play Outside Yet--Too Dangerous
My impression of those communities was that of a forgotten world, with families left to survive on their own, with many of the children and adults underweight, and some severely malnourished. We were able to give some food to each family that came through; and to the children with the most serious undernourishment, we gave a bag of powdered nutritional supplement.
Is it enough? For those living a more comfortable life, the situation looks like it has gone back to normal, but the loss of the crops in those communities means that the majority of families have lost their main source of income for the year. In an already poor region where the people stretch each dollar they earn to provide for their families, the coming weeks, months, and year will be extremely difficult.
Programa Velasco is seeking to reinvest in the future of these communities – both by supporting immediate needs like food, clean water, medicine, cleaning supplies and hygiene products
and long-term needs like reinforcing the levee (which broke during the floods) and the replanting of the crops, so that the people can begin to generate income again. We also believe that education is the most powerful tool for self-empowerment, and we would like to expand our scholarship program next year to the rural communities in the Bajo Lempa where the economic situation is extremely difficult, now more than ever.
Please join us in support of this work – make a one-time donation to buy immediate needs like food and medicine; become a Compañero/a to support long-term projects in San Ramon and in the rural communities, or sponsor a child for the 2012 school year. Learn more at www.programavelasco.org
In gratitude and hope,
Juan and the Programa Velasco Team