Spinning Wool Into Gold
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HOLIDAY 2019 || HEIFER.ORG PAGE 27 - THE MOST IMPORTANT CHRISTMAS CATALOG IN THE WORLD HEIFER ECUADOR Spinning Wool Into PLUS Glutinous Rice Balls, Dehydrated Fish & KFC: Gold Holiday Feasts Around the World EMMY-WINNER UZO 12 ADUBA GIVES BACK 38 MEN AT WORK IN RWANDA WHY WE NEED MORE FEMALE JOURNALISTS AT 46 THE U.S.-MEXICO BORDER Heifer Marketplace offers the ultimate one-stop shopping solution. Find great gifts that make a big impact. FREE SHIPPING WWW.HEIFER.ORG/MARKETPLACE CHECK YOUR EMPLOYEE MATCHING GIFT PROGRAM TO DO YOU MATCH? DOUBLE YOUR DONATION Your company may match your gifts to Heifer International. Use our handy checklist below and complete the easy steps today: ❑ Give to Heifer. Thank you for your recent gift! ❑ Visit www.heifer.org/matching and find your employee matching gift program to double your recent gift. ❑ Once you submit your matching gift claim, call or email us and we’ll send you a matching gift canvas backpack! 888.5HUNGER (888.548.6437) | [email protected] | WWW.HEIFER.ORG/MATCHING horizons Dear Determined Humanitarians, s we stand at the cusp of a new decade, I am struck that we have just A 10 years to achieve our goal of ending hunger for good. And while we have evolved our work over the past 75 years with that purpose in mind, there is more urgency now than ever to expand the work to bring true, systemic change to the most marginalized families. Despite the shifts in our approach, the way we’ve told the story of the true effect of our work has not changed much. You’re familiar with the arc: A struggling family receives Heifer CEO Pierre Ferrari, a gift animal and training in its care, purchasing goods from becomes part of a group that is taught shop owner Gita Acchami to identify and act upon their shared in Khayarmara, Nepal. values and eventually helps transform their community. In short, we teach a In Nepal, this looks like 255,500 read here — from women’s groups man to fish. We tell that story because farming families organized into in Ecuador reclaiming ancestral it’s genuine and enormously effective. 11,000 self-help groups and 226 textile traditions to move toward As we aim to complete our entrepreneurial cooperatives. starting their own enterprises, mission and work with others to The power those women have in to a new model of program in achieve the Sustainable Development cooperatives has allowed them Rwanda that is changing lives Goals — which come with the to change the market for their and livelihoods there, particularly looming 2030 deadline — we are goats. Where they previously in the realm of gender equity. shifting in both intention, action either sold goats at a net loss or As always, I leave you with the and narrative to an approach we had to take them to India to access utmost gratitude for the support know will sustainably transform decent markets, they’re using throughout the decades and shifts in the communities in the most their collective power to cut out approach. I hope you now realize your need. How? By both teaching the middlemen and sell to local donations transcend charity — and families to fish and showing consumers at a benefit to everyone. allow farmers to escape mechanisms them where the fish are biting. Allowing farmers to buy in to that kept them marginalized and We will still start with communities their own change means they will to participate in systems that allow in the most need. We will still confidently collaborate with others them to be truly independent. place assets and provide trainings. along the value chain. The end result Families will still organize into is a market system that has changed Yours for a better world, self-help groups and act on shared because of the farmers’ presence, and values to drive change. Now, because they’ve learned to work in though, we’re extending the scope collaborative union with one another. of projects and focusing on the I hope you see the themes of true, Pierre U. Ferrari entirety of the market system. systematic change in the stories you @HeiferCEO HEIFER.ORG | 1 Feed the Hungry. FEED YOUR FAITH. Heifer International is a nonprofit dedicated to helping the least of these around the world lift themselves out of hunger and poverty. Our faith programs allow your congregation to join us on our journey toward a poverty-free future. Visit www.heifer.org/faith today for free resources. LIVING ANIMAL GIFT CRACKERS MARKET A RESOURCE FOR CHILDREN AND YOUTH MINISTRIES EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO HOST YOUR OWN ALTERNATIVEGIVING EVENT LIVING GIFT FILL THE ANIMAL FEEDING MARKET ARK CRACKERS 5000 Tools for an Four-Week Resources Rotational Alternative Family Giving for Vacation Curriculum Giving Event Calendar Bible School #HEIFERFAITH | WWW.HEIFER.ORG/FAITH | 888.5HUNGER (888.548.6437) TIME TO TAKE STRIDES AGAINST HUNGER Heifer International is teaming up with companies to take employees on a virtual race into our work around the world. To learn more about creating a healthier work environment while supporting our mission, go to StridesAgainstHunger.com or email [email protected]. STRIDESAGAINSTHUNGER.COM table of contents | Holiday 2019 WWW.HEIFER.ORG Spinning Wool Into Gold In the Andes of Ecuador, indigenous 14 communities are raising alpacas and using the animals’ wool to break the cycle of poverty, all while taking care of a delicate ecosystem and reclaiming fiber art traditions. Men at Work In rural Rwanda, men often avoid the 38 “women’s work” of tending to children and gardens, and their rates of alcoholism and domestic violence are high. Through training and participation in a Heifer project, attitudes are changing, and that’s leading to healthy relationships, gender equity and better livelihoods. Why We Need More Female COVER: María Juana Journalists at the U.S.-Mexico Border Chaluisa spins alpaca 46 Writer Alice Driver travels with migrants headed fiber into yarn. north to the U.S. border to understand and share TOP: José Pedro Pallo their stories. She writes about why women and Cuzco tends to his herd of LGBTQ individuals on the border are not being alpacas in Apahua, Ecuador. represented and what needs to change to honor Photos by Joe Tobiason their perspectives. HEIFER.ORG | 3 letters READERS RESPOND else consumers can do. Is there a how much they pay. Ask coffee brand/company or co-op that your barista or email your works with the farmers? Please help favorite company requesting us make better choices because this information, or visit I doubt there are very many that www.transparenttradecoffee. will give up their morning coffee. org for a list of specialty roasters BEVERLY ROUNSAVILLE who voluntarily disclose prices. Riverside, California We believe an appropriate starting price is $3-4 per pound I was upset to learn of the desperate for commodity-grade coffee, situation of the coffee farmers. It although this is unfortunately was even more upsetting not to rare to find on shelves. If your be offered suggestions as to what preferred brand or shop isn’t we can do about the situation. No paying fairly, tell them so and mention was made of Fair Trade consider shopping elsewhere. coffee, which I always buy thinking • Talk about unfair coffee prices that means the farmers get a with friends and family. Share THE COFFEE CONUNDRUM decent price for their coffee bean news articles about the I am a longtime contributor and harvest. Is that not true? Have we coffee economy on social have just read the article in your been misled? What about a boycott media, and tag major coffee recent magazine about coffee and of coffee houses that do not pay a conglomerates when you do. the predicament for coffee farmers. fair price to the farmer? We need • Know that while certification I am distressed but the article direction, Heifer. You’ve brought the programs do often raise the bar in gave little information about what problem to our attention. You can’t terms of social and environmental individual coffee drinkers can do. stop there. Waiting for more. Cheers. standards, that doesn’t Just give up coffee? Can that really DIANE ADLER necessarily mean farmers earn have any impact? I would appreciate enough. For example, Fair Trade’s an article in your next publication As a dedicated coffee drinker who minimum price of $1.40 a pound laying out a recommendation views a fine cup of coffee as one of falls short of what farmers need. for individuals like myself. life’s true pleasures, I am appalled This isn’t the last you will hear MAGGIE TEAL that we pay dearly for our valued of this issue, and we greatly Sanford, Florida brew while the growers live in appreciate your support. abject poverty. How can we join I found the article regarding coffee our voices and take action? farmers in the fall issue of World Ark ANNE MURR WE WANT TO very enlightening. I had no idea that Osceola, Iowa coffee farmers received so little for HEAR FROM YOU! their crops when we pay so much Editor’s note: We received a Please send your comments to for coffee. I just have one question. number of emails in response to [email protected]. While Heifer is rethinking their our “Coffee at a Crossroads” article. Include your name, city, and strategy toward the coffee industry, Currently Heifer is outlining a a telephone number or email what can we, as consumers, do to pathway to change. As we explore address. Letters may be edited for length and clarity, and help? I’ve already given up buying long-term ways to help coffee may be published online as the expensive coffee drinks, or farmers, here are some things well as in print.