Perspective

You Get What You Give

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:30:00 +0000

Here’s a bit of advice to help you navigate what promises to be yet another frantic holiday season, fraught with the dichotomies that have become the hallmark of the modern Christmas.

If you want joy, happiness and hope this season - then give joy, happiness and hope.

Simply put, you get what you give.

If you’re looking for joy, then give the kind of joy an orphaned or abandoned child will feel when your gift rescues them from what promises to be a short and brutal life in the filthy back alleys of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

If you’re seeking happiness, then give the kind of happiness a mother will feel as her child receives life-saving medicine and medical attention provided by your gift.

If you’re searching for hope, then find hope in giving a gift that frees an entire family from the soul-crushing poverty that is their inheritance simply because of where they were born.

Joy, happiness and hope are waiting, for you and the world's poorest families, in this year’s HOPE International Development Agency Gifts of Hope Christmas Catalog.

Visit www.hope-international.com today and chose from a selection of gifts that will last well beyond the season, never fade, never fall out of fashion, and never lose their usefulness.

When No Usurps Yes

noreply@blogger.com (David - Executive Director) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 12:27:00 +0000

Having witnessed the carnage wrought upon humanity when no usurps yes, I can only hope and pray that enough of us on this terrestrial ball of more than 6 billion people still believe in yes, especially when it comes to helping the poor.

Yes only lives if we say it and act upon it. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the same holds true for the poor. In fact, their life of extreme impoverishment - something they did not bargain for, but rather, received as their birthright - can only be remedied by a yes. In short, they live if yes lives. To put it in less esoteric terms, they live if we give.

When no usurps yes, however, the poor are robbed of their hope and their lives - as is the case for the 25,000 children worldwide who lost their lives to poverty today.

At HOPE International Development Agency, we believe in yes because we’ve seen its transforming power in action in the lives of the world’s poorest families.

For yes to live, and subsequently, for the poor to live, people like you need to keep saying yes and giving.

Put another way, saying yes is the only way to commute the sentence of suffering and death that looms over the heads of the world’s poorest families every hour of every day.

The hope of the poor continues to rest in a heartfelt yes.

Learn more about the power of saying yes by visiting us at www.hope-international.com today where you can read about what happens when people like you say yes!

Clean water arrives for 100,000 people in Derashe Woreda, Ethiopia

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 06:00:00 +0000

The people of southern Ethiopia’s Derashe Woreda were literally drinking themselves to death when HOPE International Development Agency first arrived a decade ago.

At the time, only 11 percent of the people living in Derashe had access to sources of drinkable water, most of which were not reliable. The rest of the population had no source of clean drinking water. The water they could find came from filthy ponds or the silt-laden remains of dried up riverbeds - both of which were teeming with deadly parasites and bacteria.

The consequences were devastating, as evidenced by the fact that 17 of 100 children in this region were dying before the age of five.

Today, more than 100,000 people in Derashe have access to abundant and sustainable supplies of clean water – right in their villages! Their hard work and the support of generous HOPE International Development Agency donors made it possible to construct the 80 water systems now serving the population of Derashe.

Yet as we celebrate with the people of Derashe, we are mindful of people in Bonke Woreda, a neighboring region where clean water is simply not available. Disease is ravaging their villages and their children are dying at a rate equal or greater to that of Derashe before the arrival of clean water. More than 22,000 people in the area are in need of clean water and we have begun work that will result in each one of them gaining access to abundant and reliable sources of clean water!

Visit HOPE International Development Agency to learn more today.

Examining the soul-wrenching choices faced by the poor

noreply@blogger.com (David - Executive Director) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 23:01:00 +0000

We have all heard or seen statistics that illuminate the devastating impact of poverty worldwide.

For example, in the one-minute or so it takes you to read this post, nearly 20 children worldwide will have died as a direct result of the abject poverty that has dominion over every aspect of their existence.

While poverty statistics are good for illuminating the scale of poverty in our world, they are woefully inadequate when it comes to illuminating the personal nature of abject poverty.

To gain a better understanding of the poverty that plagues the estimated 1.8 billion people on our planet who live on less than $1 per day, we need to examine the soul-wrenching choices faced by the poor as they struggle to survive, hour by hour, day by day.

It is mealtime in a rural village in Cambodia and a family gathers on the floor of their thatched home for the day’s meal - a single bowl of rice accompanied by a bitter concoction of mashed roots and leaves scavenged from the forest floor. The meal has little or no nutritional value, but it does fill empty bellies and quell the hunger pangs, at least for a few hours. The parents, despite their exhaustion and hunger, take only a few spoonfuls of food, having decided that the welfare of their children is more important than their own. This week, they will make this choice more often than not.

Night descends on a slum in Ethiopia and a widowed mother prepares to step out into the dingy alley to sell her body in the hopes of earning a few dollars to buy food for her three children. She has tried every possible means of earning money, but to no avail. Impoverished and marginalized, poverty has sealed her fate as she trades her well being for that of her children.

The sun has barely risen in shantytowns throughout the developing world and orphaned children, some as young as 7 years-old, have already been scouring through the garbage of the more fortunate for 2 hours, looking for scraps of food that will constitute the day’s meal, and discarded items they can sell to earn a few pennies. Abuse, violence, and hustling to survive will punctuate their 18-hour day. Sleep is the only freedom from the nightmare that is their waking life and even it is difficult to come by when your bed is a piece of dirty cardboard on the ground.

Our days are full of choices as well. Few, if any, will resemble the soul-wrenching choices faced by the poor in their moment-by-moment existence.

There is one choice we can make, however, that would alleviate the suffering faced by the poor… the choice to give.

How the impossible became possible for Mahdevamma

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 12:08:00 +0000

Mahdevamma was born into absolute poverty in south India.

Her birthright assured her a place among a club none of us would willingly join - the 1.3 billion people in our world who live in abject poverty.

Her inheritance - the seemingly inevitable worldwide consequence of being poor, female, and marginalized - would be a short life of suffering and servitude.

As the years passed and Mahdevamma passed through childhood to womanhood, she found no comfort in the realization that poverty intended to be her life-long companion.

Women like Mahdevamma would not be surprised to learn that they are among startling statistics that shed light on the scale and scope of the suffering she and other women know all to well…

Of the world’s poorest 1.3 billion people, 70 per cent are women

Of the world’s poorest 1.3 billion people, 70 per cent are women

Of the world’s 33 million refugees, 72 per cent are women and children

Two thirds of the world’s illiterate people are women

Of the millions of people who go to bed hungry every night, seven of every ten are women and children

Mahdevamma, however, had no intention of remaining poverty’s prisoner and was determined to ensure that her three children would not suffer the same fate she had endured since the first breath she took as a baby.

Mahdevamma found her way out of poverty when she joined a HOPE International Development Agency self-help affinity group (SAG) in her village of Sagare, south India.

Self-help affinity groups provide education, skills training, low interest loans, and other forms of support - all of which enable impoverished women to create sustainable livelihoods and lift themselves up out of poverty.

Initially, the group was comprised of Mahdevamma and five of her friends. Eventually, 15 other women in similar circumstances joined the group, bringing the total to 20 women.

“When I first joined the self-help affinity group my family and I lived in a mud hut and were trying to eke out a living farming one acre of land on which we grew millet and lentils,” says Mahdevamma.

“Initially, there was resistance from the village men. But they soon learned to respect us as we built up our confidence and ability to do things,” states Mahdevamma.

In addition to learning new income generating skills, each of the self-help affinity group members sets aside modest amounts of money per week into a group savings fund. The fund provides low interest loans for sustainable income generating initiatives undertaken by group members.

Once the savings had grown sufficiently, Mahdevamma took out a low interest loan and bought an additional acre of land on which she started growing cotton and coconuts for consumption and sale. With the first harvest, she was well on her way to a sustainable income!

The benefits of being a member of a self-help affinity group and learning new skills speak for themselves according to Mahevamma. “Today, I now have more savings, a sustainable income, farm animals and productive land! My three children - two boys and one girl - are now in school, “she proudly states.

Mahevamma changed her family’s destiny by joining a self-help affinity group that gave her the training, support, and modest financial help she needed to transform her family’s life.

“It would have been impossible for me to think of all this in the past, but now it is possible!”, says Mahevamma.

To date, Mahevamma’s self-help affinity group has helped establish three additional groups in her village – further evidence of what can be accomplished when people gather to tackle challenges they all face.

Haiti – A Container Full of Hope

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 00:00:00 +0000

As a parent raising a family in the Artibonite Valley of Haiti, you can expect to watch one of every eight children in your community die before their fifth birthday.

No parent in your community is immune to the probability that one of the children caught in the grip of the reality portrayed by such a sickening statistic will be yours.

The heartbreaking loss of children in such high numbers is exacerbated by the fact that nearly all of the deaths among children under the age of five are preventable if - and it is a big if - basic medicines and medical care were readily available.

Adults, despite having survived childhood in same impoverished environment that is robbing children of their lives today, are not immune to the deadly affects of poverty.

As an adult, your life expectancy - reduced by two decades because of the poverty that is the hallmark of your existence - will be less than 53 years!

HOPE International Development Agency is helping the doctors and nurses of Hospital Albert Schweitzer, in the Artibonite Valley of central Haiti, change these terrifying statistics.

A huge shipping container, chalked full of basic medical supplies, surgical equipment, antibiotics, and other medicines sent by HOPE International Development Agency, recently arrived at Hospital Albert Schweitzer for immediate use among the 300,000 people that depend on the hospital for their primary health care and community health support. The medicines and supplies will help the hospital meet the health needs of families in the Artibonite Valley for the next 12 months.

With nearly 80 percent of Haiti’s population living in absolute poverty - a point driven home by the fact that Haiti’s people are ranked as having the worst health in the hemisphere - these medicines and supplies are as precious as the lives they will save.

Preventing disease and healing the sick does far more than the obvious - it provides Haiti’s poorest families with proof that it is possible to have hope amidst circumstances that would suggest otherwise.

Hope is present!

Visit HOPE International Development Agency today to learn more about our work among the world's poorest families.

Cambodia – Kavey frees herself from the poverty that held her captive for 43 years!

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 04:05:00 +0000

Kavey, a 43-year old widow and mother of 4 children, lives in the small village of Thkol Thom in Cambodia’s Pursat Province.

Until recently, life had been a constant struggle for survival for Kavey and her family – a struggle that they had little hope of winning.

Despite Kavey’s best efforts, which included working herself to near exhaustion in the rice fields and businesses of the more fortunate people in her community, money was always in very short supply. The wages were simply too low. Food was scarce and the hunger had become chronic. Kavey’s dream of sending her children to school was simply out of the question because she was so poor.

Two years ago, however, life began to change for the better after Kavey joined a local HOPE International Development Agency self help group.

Looking back on it now, Kavey realizes that joining the self help group was the first step in her journey toward self-reliance. The group, made up of a number of local women in similar circumstances, welcomed Kavey and immediately began telling her about the methods they had learned and used to transform their lives.

Kavey’s first loan from the self help group was $50, which she used to start a small grocery shop. As the shop became more and more successful, Kavey’s ability to provide for her family and save some of her earnings every month grew as well. After repaying her first loan right on time, Kavey took out a second loan of $100 in order to increase the inventory in her grocery shop and make it even more successful!

Today, because of her own initiative and participation in the self help group, Kavey and her family have a reliable source of income. The income has enabled Kavey to expand her shop, increase her savings, put nutritious food on the table at every meal, and most importantly for Kavey, send two of her school-aged children to school!

Having conquered the poverty that had trapped her for 43 years, Kavey is confident that her family’s life will continue to improve and that her children will not be trapped by poverty as she was.

Philippines: Education for indigenous children

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Poverty is often viewed solely within the present tense. The long-term consequences, however, can be equally troubling. This is particularly true when it comes to children who do not have the benefit of an education.

For Leila, a young mother and member of group of neglected and poor indigenous people in the Philippines, the long-term consequences of poverty have and continue to be devastating.

Leila believes the poverty she endures today is a direct result of being denied an education when she was a child. She worries that her children's experience will the same as hers... and for good reason!

About 75 percent of children not in school right now have mothers who did not have the opportunity to attend school.

In addition to helping families with their immediate needs, HOPE International Development Agency donors are addressing the long-term consequences of poverty by providing scholarships to indigenous children whose impoverished parents cannot afford an education for their children.

The one-year scholarships provide everything children need, including tuition fees, school books, and supplies. In addition, the scholarships also provide nutrition training, health education, and nutritional supplements for children. Enhanced skills training for rural teachers and additional resource materials for rural schools are also provided.

By providing these scholarships, HOPE donors are addressing both the immediate and long-term needs of indigenous Filipino families and the communities within which they live.

Leila's children will not inherit the poverty that has marred her life. Her children will be the first generation to attend school and in doing so, they will have the opportunity to break the cycle of poverty that has kept their communities impoverished for generation after generation.

Learn more about how you can help send children to school this September by visiting www.hope-international.com

With a Little Help From Friends

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 12:11:00 +0000

Impoverished families often find themselves tossed aside, left to languish on the side of the road like discarded household items that are either broken or deemed less than useful by their owners.

When HOPE International Development Agency first met Marie Fe, she was an impoverished young Filipino mother residing in the Philippine city of Calamansian - discarded by society you might say

When our HOPE Filipino colleagues spoke with Marie Fe, they did not see a broken woman tossed aside by society; they saw a person who had a valuable contribution to make, to both her community and her family!

Today, through her ingenuity and hard work, and a little help from a HOPE micro credit lending program, Marie Fe has created a sustainable livelihood amidst the discarded. Marie Fe’s family-run business recycles, reuses, and resells what others, far more fortunate than her, toss aside.

In addition to creating a sustainable livelihood, Marie Fe is also making a valuable contribution to the local economy and the environment. Collecting discarded, but valuable items from the streets and alleys is just one part of her business. Marie Fe’s business also buys discarded items, by the kilogram, direct from walk-in sellers, and in doing so, creates new value for her and her customers.

HOPE has had the privilege of helping Marie Fe build her business and livelihood since 1995, when a local micro credit program we established provided Marie Fe with her first modest, low interest loan. There have been a number of loans since, and in every case, Marie Fe has paid back her loans quickly – a sign that her business is thriving!

Today, Marie Fe and her family live in a modest but comfortable home, directly connected to her expanded shop and storefront. A pioneer member of our Camarin Micro Credit Branch, Marie Fe is now leads a group of 30 women entrepreneurs in her area. In addition to running her own successful business, Marie Fe tends to the needs of the members, guiding them as they develop sustainable livelihoods for themselves and their families.

Marie Fe’s success lays in her ability to see value where others cannot. She likes to say she sees the “shine”, and hence the value, just below the surface on a piece of rusty, discarded metal.

Suffering – An unintended consequence of a comfortable mind?

noreply@blogger.com (David - Executive Director) — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 00:00:00 +0000

The mind, pampered by the seemingly unending parade of comfort that accompanies life in the developed world, can quickly fall prey to rationalization.

As admirable as it may be, the ability to rationalize our way toward that which makes us comfortable, both in body and mind, often has the unintended consequence of abandoning others to their suffering.

Rather than being deeply troubled by the plight of orphaned and abandoned children in places such as Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, for example, many of us find a way to rationalize not helping these children – some of whom are a mere 5 years-old.

We should be deeply troubled and frankly, very uncomfortable with the fact that an 11 year-old girl, abandoned to the streets of Addis because she lost her parents, has her childhood stolen from her one night in a dark alley. We should be moved to action by the troubled lives of the more than 3.8 million orphans whose trajectory is not unlike the 11 year-old girl just described.

Yes friend, we should be moved. Perhaps even more importantly, we should be very wary of that which impedes being moved - our ability to rationalize away the hurt and needs of others. This is especially true when you consider that in most cases, it costs us little or nothing to help relative to what we have and enjoy.

The comfortable mind is dangerous to our health and potentially deadly to millions of people worldwide. It is a mind untroubled by the plight and suffering of those who can offer no comfort, to us or themselves.

In the end, however, we soon discover that no amount of comfort can answer for the consequences.

Ethiopia: Going to ends of the earth for clean water - on foot, if necessary

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 19:04:00 +0000

In late spring, HOPE International Development Agency completed a memorable health and sanitation education series in six communities in Dereshe, the southern district where for the last decade we have focused our efforts to bring clean water and basic health to Ethiopia’s poorest villages.

As we approached full clean water coverage for Dereshe district this year, the communities we helped were increasingly remote. The poverty in these villages is exacerbated by their geographic isolation; inaccessible by roads, they are forgotten the rest of the population. Whatever political voice the rural poor might have does not carry over these distances, and so villages furthest from urban centers tend to be the most neglected, the most destitute.

HOPE exists for the sake of the poorest of the poor—an overused expression, but in the case of these villages, a very apt one. Because of this, our Ethiopian staff were more than willing to meet the challenges entailed in serving these far-flung villages of the south.

In order to provide the villagers with the health and sanitation training that is such a necessary component of the clean water program, our training officers walked long distances over all manner of terrain. There are no roads to make the trips by car, and the people in these villages live up on hills and farm in the valleys below. So, in the words of one Ethiopian staff member, “climbing up the hills for up to 10 kilometers round trip for a day’s teaching was a regular day at the office for our staff.”

He went on to remark that “It is a testament to their commitment that they were able to complete their work on time. The equally impressive commitment and hard work of the communities was essential to the success of the project. Each community brought out up to 50 volunteers daily to contribute their labour. This community participation and sense of ownership is the cornerstone of our project.”

He is correct: without this spirit of participation, of passion, of commitment, the task of providing the poorest of the poor with a measurably higher standard of life would founder. We see this spirit again and again in our staff members as well as in the families that actually benefit from the work. It is something that never fails to secure our admiration—and gratitude.

Sudan: Where Disease and Poverty Collide - and Collaborate

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 10:51:00 +0000

In a country where all pressing needs can really and truly be called ‘basic’, Southern Sudan’s health care system is still exceptional in its inadequacy. It is barely existent.

This stunningly poor nation is repeatedly singled out as having the worst health situation in the world. Here, one of out seven mothers will die giving birth. In some areas, there is one doctor for every 500,000 people.

Though throughout the developing world, scourges like malaria and diarrhea exact a huge toll, nowhere else on the planet do people contend with those threats in addition to a strange concentration of tropical diseases that have been eradicated in other nations.

Considering how profound this level of need is, HOPE International Development Agency’s medical supplies donation programme in Southern Sudan is a no-brainer. The relationship between health and poverty is obvious (how can you till your field if you are sick with dysentery?) but many do not realize how significantly the two are actually linked.

For example, we know that anaemia alone reduces Gross Domestic Product by as much as 7% in some countries (see the UN Millennium Project's Halving Hunger report). Imagine what the cumulative effect its myriad of health problems has on the economy of Sudan!

Sudan: “We will not let evil triumph”

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 13:52:00 +0000

An Ethiopian HOPE International Development Agency staff member recently visited our friends and colleagues in Sudan, Africa.

This, below, is his account of a trip to see the refugee families that HOPE has been assisting since the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) attacked their villages on the Sudan-Democratic Republic of Congo border for unknown reasons.

His experience is a plangent reminder of two things: the extraordinary stresses that our Sudanese colleagues endure in order to care for the poor and distressed, and just how profound the need for this care really is.

We had a flat tire and were late getting to the border town. About 9pm, as we approached the town, a guy jumped in front of our vehicle, pointing his AK 47 assault rifle at the head of the driver as he shouted something to us.

I was in the passenger seat next to the driver and was shocked and afraid. I did not want the armed guy to take my new NOKIA cell phone! I had only had it for one week and had used it as my camera, taking many pictures of the journey. I wanted to hide it somewhere before they came up to the car. The problem was it was in my shirt pocket. Moving my hand just then could be fatal. The guy still has his gun aimed right at us.

The gunman shouted something. The Bishop, who was driving, turned his headlights off. Then he turned on the light inside the vehicle. Now I could see nothing outside. Where was the gunman? Would he approach from my side? No, he would most probably approach from the driver's side. Surely he would not hurt a Bishop.

The gunman then appeared on the driver's side and said something loud and harsh. I heard the word “Bishop” in the driver’s answer. Suddenly the gunman says, “Hey Bishop!” He then smiles, taps on the vehicle’s roof and says something in a light voice and laughs, as if this was just a joke.

The Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) sees the Bishop laughing as we resume driving. As if this was nothing but an introduction. I later realised it was just relief that had the Bishop laughing, not the LRA. I was quiet for the rest of the drive.

The next morning, I met and talked with victims of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). Led by a possessed man named Joseph Kony, the LRA is a terrorist organization with no real political agenda. The LRA has been terrorizing people in Uganda, southern Sudan, and The Democratic Republic of Congo.

A Pastor that had been displaced along with his congregation described to me what happened in his village in February of this year.

“At midnight we heard gunfire. The LRA had killed 16 people. They took many children and looted everything we had. All we could do was run for our lives. Today, we have nothing left. We cannot go back. They can come back at any time. It is a chance we cannot take.” I could feel the terror in his voice as he told me the story. I could read the pain on his face.

This is pure evil. It displaces entire villages, enslaves children, and destroys lives. I hate it. That is why I am here. I want to do something good. I want to bring healing. I want to tell these people that there is some good in the world and that there are good people in the world – and that these good people will stand with them in this their darkest hour. They will help them pick up the pieces and stand on their own feet again.

I am here because HOPE International Development Agency is working with The Episcopal Church of Sudan to help these displaced people. I promised them we would not forget about them. We will not let evil triumph.

Then I quietly suggested to Bishop Kamani that we start the drive back early. Now that I have met its victims, I had no desire to meet the LRA.

It goes without saying that all of the people at HOPE International Development Agency feel the same way. Stories like these make us so grateful for our overseas colleagues. Their experiences feed into the heart of our endeavours, giving us the passion we need to sustain the work.

African Food Security: Obama’s Administration on Right Track

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 10:15:00 +0000

Just as the numbers of hungry people on the planet are reaching a historic high, we are seeing positive signs of change, at least so far as American policy is concerned.

In connection with his recent visit to Africa, Barack Obama released a statement indicating that the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is preparing to significantly retool its approach to food aid.

Rather than continue to spend its aid dollars on food that is transported to hungry communities, his administration intends to invest into African agriculture, or more to the point, the ability of African farmers to feed themselves. So instead of receiving a sack of American-grown grain, a villager in Malawi might receive the tools and training to grow a better crop himself.

This reflects a growing sense - one that has always informed HOPE International Development Agency's approach - that self-reliance needs to be the end goal of all so-called ‘charity’. We, in our eagerness to help, must always be evaluating whether our aid leaves people truly better off. It is encouraging to see that the American government is taking up this theme and seemingly running with it.

Learn more about helping families in the developing world become self-reliant by visiting www.hope-international.com today.

Honduras: Perspective Beyond the Political Circus

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 11:02:00 +0000

Though Honduras was buffeted by natural disasters this past year, this small Central American nation has generated comparatively greater media coverage through its latest man-made debacle.

While HOPE International Development Agency’s Honduran partners were busy helping people to recover from severe flooding and a 7.1 earthquake, President Manuel Zelaya’s June 28th deposition suddenly became a colorful ringside attraction in the urban circus that the poor may not have the time to attend.

While expressions like ‘military coup’ might conjure stereotypes of dysfunctional Third World politics, the reality on the ground has been, according to our Honduran friends, much quieter than one might expect.

It is also worth noting that the ‘crisis’ of a deposed President has somewhat overshadowed the circumstances preceding Zelaya’s fall from grace. In fact, Zelaya had been about to hold a referendum on the constitution that would have potentially allowed him to extend his rule past the legal term limit.

Our friend and colleague in Tegucigalpa shared a few of his thoughts about this very complex situation, and they are worth reproducing here:

For the first time in Latin America, a country has rebelled , and without shedding any blood and without violence, against a constitutional and democratically elected President who has violated the constitution and legal orders from the Supreme Court, the Congress and the Attorney General of the country.

The international press had not understood this nor have they taken the time to study what has been happening in Honduras over the past year. They have simply taken a position saying that this has been a military overthrow of the government of Honduras - as something coming out of the cold war of twenty – thirty years ago.

However, the lesson coming out of this is that a President, who has been democratically elected by the people of this country, does not have the right to disobey the constitution and the laws of this country.

The message of Honduras is simple, if a president has received the popular vote of the country, this does not give him or her the license to break the laws, as all the effort going into governing a country for the common good should be done within the framework of the law.

The general public of democratic countries will be seeing these actions and will see that they no longer need to tolerate the abuses of power by constitutionally elected presidents who many times consider themselves untouchable because they were elected by the people. Big mistake….. ask Mel Zelaya!

While Hondurans living in severe poverty never have an easy row to hoe, we are relieved that, despite the political drama, conditions throughout the country are mostly very peaceful. Certainly, HOPE’s work has not experienced any disruptions whatsoever. It is our hope that this ‘crisis’ is resolved to the satisfaction of the majority of Hondurans. They, like all people, would prefer a government that respects the severity of their struggle as well as the importance of their institutions.

Self-indulgence - The new self-reliance

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 17:35:00 +0000

In the developed world, our aspirations appear to have evolved well beyond the notion of self-reliance.

You could not find fault with a person who observes that the definition of self-reliance has undergone a radical revision and now has more in common with self-indulgence than self-reliance.

This new definition is very alluring, as evidenced by the fact that many of us can no longer define, at least from a moral perspective, at what point we would have enough money, possessions, or status. The fact that it has taken a worldwide financial crisis to remind us that there is in fact something out there called “enough”, should be a warning to us all to revisit our moral compass.

Having enough used to be defined within the confines of an appropriate measure of self-reliance. More recently, however, having enough is defined as never having enough.

The tragedy of confusing self-indulgence with self-reliance is twofold.

Firstly, if you cannot define, from a moral perspective, what enough means for you, you are likely to never have enough.

Secondly, and most importantly for the poor of our world, if your definition of having enough does not include helping those who have nothing, they will continue to suffer and perish as they do now.

Never before has it been so important to so many that each of us define, from a moral perspective, what it means to have enough - this is the only way to ensure that we will all have enough.

To learn more about HOPE International Development Agency’s work among the poor, please visit www.hope-international.com

Hunger: Over One Billion Under-Served

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 22:14:00 +0000

According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Association, we have reached a sad milestone. Over one billion people living on the planet are now hungry, a new record for the scourge of malnutrition. Due to the global economic crisis and persistently high food prices, one in six people are subsisting on less than 1,800 calories per day.

When we enter ‘1,800 calories’ into an internet search engine, we produce just under one million hits. However, it takes more patience than we have on supply to comb through the links in order to find just website referencing this threshold figure for inadequate diet - instead, these links appear to be mainly meal plans for dieting Westerners. As freedieting.com helpfully states: ‘1800 calories per day is about the lowest a man should go when aiming for fat loss.’

Presumably, in most of the developing world, there is not a lot of fat to spare. According to a study by a USDA economist, the average sub-Saharan African is consuming around 2,176 calories per day, compared to an average American’s 3,654. Whereas the typical Western diet showed a distribution of calories from varied food sources (18% of an American’s calories might come from sugar alone), the African derives 70% of his or her energy from grains and starchy root vegetables. More nutritious food is not available or is simply too expensive.

This study was based on 1995-97 statistics. Likely the data would be different today, reflecting an even more pronounced gap between developed and developing worlds. While body-conscious Westerners work on their self-control, over one billion people are already on the 1,800 calorie diet through no choice of their own.

Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Honduras: An Unprecedented Time of Disaster?

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:59:00 +0000

As we prepare to send a second shipment of emergency medications to the Swat Valley, Pakistan, we are asking ourselves whether we have ever received so many calls for help from so many quarters of the world in such a short period of time.

In Pakistan, an extraordinary refugee crisis (3 million displaced) in the troubled Swat Valley has compelled us to respond with emergency medical shipments. In Sri Lanka, the fallout from the Tamil-government conflagration is enormous; refugees there are in great need of supplies and shelters. In Bangladesh, we are helping to assist 4 million people who are injured or homeless in the wake of a cyclone and extensive flooding. In Honduras, an earthquake has destroyed homes, infrastructure, and livelihoods, and we are working with survivors to heal and rebuild.

Each one of these disasters is extreme in its own right, but taken together, they amount to an overwhelming constituency of sufferers. Our own capacity to respond is pushed to the utmost.

For an organization that is geared towards finding long-term solutions to poverty, this congestion of emergency-based, short-term assistance is difficult. However, it is because we have a long-term commitment in each of these countries that we must help when their fortunes take such a nightmarish turn. We, like they, have no choice.

Through us, right now, people in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Honduras are depending on people who so often choose to invest in long-term solutions, like clean water and food security. Will they be generous in these exception circumstances? Experience has shown us that they will be. Still, it is a test for our supporters - just as it is a test for us.

We have sent out an emergency appeal for donations to each of these countries. We truly hope that our friends will help them to survive this terrible chapter in their struggle for development.

Pakistan, the Swat Valley: 12 Medical Teams Equipped

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 01:00:00 +0000

The UN now reports that the mass exodus of people from Pakistan’s Swat valley is the largest refugee crisis since 1994’s Rwandan genocide. In three week’s time, almost 1.5 million people have fled the area, where government forces are fighting to eradicate Taliban strongholds.

Fortunately, we received word that our staff in Pakistan received our most recent medical shipment. We assembled this shipment specifically to equip the medical teams tending to the families stranded in camps across Mardan district. Twelve teams are treating refugees on a daily basis; they will ultimately administer life-saving medications to thousands. Special attention, as always, is given to expecting mothers and infants, who are very vulnerable to infections, especially in the severely hot weather that has made their displacement all the more terrible.

Abbotsford, BC: The Run for Water

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 11:49:00 +0000

The 2009 ‘Run for Water’, held on May 31st in Abbotsford, B.C., was an unqualified success. Thanks to the dedication of the Run for Water Society, and the 1,600 people who participated in the premiere running event, $81,000 was raised for clean water in southern Ethiopia. An endowment like this has a tremendously positive impact in the villages where HOPE International Development Agency is at work - especially when you consider that it costs only $35 to give a southern Ethiopian clean water for life.

It is wonderful when a good time and a good cause dovetail. But it isn’t lost on us that behind this fun, sunny, celebratory event, is a huge investment of time, energy, thought, planning, and labour on the part of the Society. We are incredibly grateful to this adventurous and kind-hearted group of friends for choosing to partner with HOPE International Development Agency.

Learn more about the Run for Water:

Bangladesh: A Song from Jhenidah’s Survivors

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Fri, 29 May 2009 16:31:00 +0000

The children HOPE cares for in Jhenidah, Bangladesh, put on an impromptu concert for a visitor from our Canadian office two weeks ago.

This is the type of activity - a safe, playful, creative time together - that the children have found most rehabilitative. Coming, as all they do, from such wretchedly painful experiences, the freedom to play and sing is of great therapeutic value.

There is no poverty like that of parent-less children in developing world conditions - in this, the two axes of social and economic deterioration intersect. Theirs is a vulnerability so profound that they either grow thick skins of criminality or they are enslaved by stronger agents. Abuse or be abused.

As for these children, they are safe enough to sing. Their performance is all the more beautiful if you are one of the many people who have made this safe place possible for them.

Sustainability and the poor

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 21 May 2009 09:09:00 +0000

We frequently hear about ‘the economy’ and ‘the environment’ being pitted against each other in a kind of zero-sum contest, never feeling very sure of what side it is in our best interest to root for. But in our work with the poorest families in the world, we often see this paradigm undone.

Where we work, the economy (or ‘means to eat, be housed, and be clothed’) and the environment (or ‘place from where you get that which you eat, wear, and live in’) are not really different things at all. Families in the Dominican Republic, for example, have an economy because they have the land and water to grow their crops. They can’t have one thing without the other. Because this concept is so elementary to them, ‘sustainable’ practices often come naturally. In fact, all over the world, HOPE International Development Agency families easily choose practices that protect their land as well as bolster their economies.

What is sustainability? It is nothing more than ‘meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’. The reason a Dominican farmer uses techniques that nurture rather than deplete the land is not because he feels guilty about global warming, or because HOPE won’t help him unless he sacrifices some economic advantage in order to be ‘green’. The reason why the Dominican farmer chooses to be sustainable is because he is well aware that his children and grandchildren will have no future unless he keeps his land healthy and productive for them.

This brings us to the most important lesson the poor have taught us about sustainability. Sustainability comes from having a heightened sense of the welfare of your children. It means doing what you have to do to ensure that the things you have today can be passed down to the generations that follow you. Poor families, who might not say the word ‘sustainability’, understand and practice the concept instinctively.

A friend of ours, Daniel Schellenberg, is a champion of applying lessons learned from the poor about sustainable living. Having spent many years in Kenya, he now resides with his extended family on a beautiful homestead in East Texas. Their ‘Propagelle Project’ is an attempt to find a way of living which is most mindful of the generations to come. Daniel’s blog is well worth reading for its insights from a person who approaches the situation of the poor and the environment with a balanced, informed, and passionate advocacy.

Afghanistan: A school truly designed for the ‘poorest of the poor’

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Fri, 15 May 2009 17:08:00 +0000

Afghanistan continues to be a place of stark need and clear opportunities for investment, especially as its young women are concerned.

The news agency IRIN tells us that ‘about two million state school students do not have access to safe drinking water and about 75 percent of these schools in Afghanistan do not have safe sanitation facilities’. In this same article, UNICEF states this lack of adequate facilities is one prominent reason that girls stay away from school. Classrooms may exist, but they are unsuitable for female students unless there are latrines nearby.

As with their clinic, the high school that HOPE International Development Agency Afghanistan is building this year will serve the poorest of the poor in the country’s northwest. Who better exemplifies real poverty than a young girl from a family without opportunities, in a region the government all but ignores, in a nation struggling so profoundly with issues of gender? Because this school’s raison d’etre is addressing the needs of the very poorest people in Afghanistan, care is being taken to ensure that this is a comfortable, appropriate place for girls. In addition to its 12 classrooms and library, the school will be equipped with a clean water system and proper washroom facilities.

Again, as with the clinic, the standard of quality that this school will reflect all but guarantees that families living all over the region will make use of it. It is an ambitious project, but services for these families should be provided with care, completeness, and attention to detail. Going the extra mile for Afghanistan’s most vulnerable citizens - its young daughters - is a necessary investment.

Sri Lanka: ‘This is our responsibility.’

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 07 May 2009 14:20:00 +0000

‘I personally feel that this is our responsibility as people who are involved in development to support, at this crucial time, our local communities to make their lives less vulnerable by providing some food and other material assistance in this fragile situation.’

We received this entreaty last week from a colleague in Sri Lanka who is on the front line of what has become a truly atrocious humanitarian situation. Reflective of the dignified persistence that all our international staff have in common, this statement touches upon the severity of the crisis with gentle understatement.

‘Fragile’ it is. Over 100,000 people have been caught in the crossfire of savage fighting between Tamil Tigers and government forces. The former is likely on its last legs, shunted to a narrow strip of territory, while the latter refuses to halt their offensive for a moment, eager to finish off Sri Lanka’s rebel movement while they have the momentum. Meanwhile, refugee camps outside the conflict zone are receiving what has been described as a ‘human avalanche’ of traumatized, starving people.

HOPE International Development Agency is mounting up its response to the crisis. As always, men and women who we Canadian staff can trust and admire will manage the distribution of live-saving supplies to displaced families. Once again, the abstract ‘emergency’ that we grapple with only in our imaginations will for them be a very tangible, very difficult, sweaty, frightening, loud, confusing, and heart-breaking reality. Now, as with always, we must do all that we can to overcome our feeling of separateness from the suffering in order to answer our Sri Lankan colleague’s challenge with nothing less than love and affirmation.

Learn how you can save lives today.

The Dominican Republic: resourceful when receiving

noreply@blogger.com (Hopeful!) — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 12:00:00 +0000

HOPE International Development Agency delivered a medical shipment to our partners in the Dominican Republic shortly after New Year’s and these supplies have been put to excellent use in the last four months. Happily, all clinics serving the poor in Ocoa province are completely stocked for the first time our Dominican friends can remember.

A staff member from the Canadian office visited the area last month and was reminded why we treasure working with our Dominican counterparts so much. The thoroughgoing hospitality of Dominicans is world-famous, but they often don’t get enough credit for their creativity and resourcefulness. These are people who will make a kingdom out of a pittance.

For example, when the distribution to the various clinics was complete, there was a supply of small items like gloves and cotton swabs left over. Not wanting to waste a single part of the donation, Dominican staff made small packages that they gave to community businesses like barber shops after performing short demonstrations of good hygienic practice. A few bits of cotton and rubber were transformed into an opportunity for community education.

In Ocoa, few opportunities are wasted and no resource is squandered. Any generosity we show in this place is generally multiplied as Ocoan people practice their particular brand of community solidarity.