Saturday I joined Norma Cruz, a Caritas worker with several communities on community management of disaster risks, to take materials to the village of Cementera in the municipality of Lepaera, in the department of Lempira.
As part of that project Caritas is helping them begin a tree nursery in their community, not only to plant trees there but also to sell to gain some funds to promote the sustainability of the project.
We arrived at 10:30, about ninety minutes late, but the people were still there and had cleared the land where the nursery would be. The people had chosen the land just behind the church and had worked with Norma on the design and the list of needed materials.
After unloading the materials from the pickup, I began helping them fill the plastic bags for the seeds and seedlings. Men, women, and even little kids filled the 1500 bags. Meanwhile others were laying out the contours of the nursery and digging holes for the posts. I’d guess there were more than 30 people working at the site.
We stopped about noon for lunch. When we came back the work continued. The needed to get some limbs for the beams and so a group of about 15 men and boys was organized to go out and find some.
The work was almost finished when we left about 4:15 pm. It lacks black netting, but should be available for use very soon.
What impressed me was the way the people worked together and the initiative that the people showed in their work. This wasn’t a case of an aid worker planning and deciding all the details of the project. The people helped with the design. They organized themselves to get it done. They even talked about some types of trees they might want to grow.
On the way up we passed through one village near Cementera. Last year, during the major tropical storm that hit Honduras in October, the people in that village went up to the people in Cementera, seeking their help to deal with the risks of landslides and more. Cementera was seen as a model for how to work in the face of disaster.
This is what aid work needs to do: provide people with tools – sometimes just the picks and shovels, sometimes organizational tools – so that they can begin to take charge of their own lives as a community.
Cementera is one example. There are problems – with some divisions in the community – but they have taken major steps. God willing, other villages will have these opportunities.
The nearly completed nursery
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