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Puente a la
Salud Comunitaria contributes to food sovereignty and advances the
health and well-being of rural communities in Mexico by promoting the
consumption, production, and commercialization of amaranth.
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Dear Friend of Puente,
Happy New Year!
Puente had an exciting holiday season. Thank you to all of our individual donors
that helped us achieve the SG Foundation’s matching grant. With your support, we now have $20,000 to invest in Puente’s programs!
And of course, a big thank you to the SG Foundation for the matching challenge!
In response to our fundraising efforts, we received an inspiring letter from one of our faithful friends and annual
donors, Montessori schoolteacher Charlene S. Trochta. Charlene was the pre-school teacher of one of
Puente’s founders, Katherine. We would like to share an excerpt of her note with our readers. It remarkably highlights what Puente aspires to be:
“I think what all of you are doing is a prime example of how to help people in circumstances such as the rural
people of Oaxaca. It is very similar to an old saying we Montessorians attribute to the little child – ‘help me to help myself’. Organizations and projects such as Puente need to be encouraged and promoted worldwide,
for they are the ones that truly do change the world for better."
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Arturo Espinoza Morales, a farmer from the Santa Catarina Tayata community, participating in Puente's "Amaranth Day" event in 2009
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We thank Ms. Trochta for her kind words and solidarity to our mission.
Donors and interested parties often ask Puente how we can assure the sustainability of our projects. No answer is simple. However, we hope to stand behind Charlene’s reference and can proudly say: we "help the communities help themselves."
In action, Puente has taken the initiative to incorporate the participatory approach to rural development in Oaxaca. The participatory approach aims to put the communities in the driver seat. Puente aims to open up opportunities that allow the communities to analyze their own opportunities and challenges with amaranth. Click here
to read more about the use of the participatory approach in Puente’s
programs.
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Puente Welcomes New Eco-Amaranth Program
Director!
Puente is excited to announce our new member on staff, Martha Elena Miranda Jimenez! Martha joined Puente in December 2009 and will be directing our Eco-Amaranth Program. After studying Biology in the Iztacala Faculty of Superior
Education at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, she started her career in plant and ecological research and later
co-founded the nonprofit organization, Autonomous Group for Environmental Investigation (GAIA) where she worked for more than ten years. At GAIA, Martha was responsible for developing a participative approach in 11 communities in the Sierra Sur regions of Oaxaca, in order to drive them towards the more sustainable management of their resources.
When asked about how it feels to join Puente's team, Martha responds:
"I am happy to contribute to an organization like Puente right as it is involved in a dynamic growth stage. Having spent a long time in the civil sector, I know that learning does not end. I greatly value the moments in which learning manifests itself into the adoption of new practices. This is vital in order to keep our mission valid and to maintain individual and collective enthusiasm within an organization during fast changing contexts.
I have gladly committed to working together with the Eco-Amaranth Program´s technical and promotion teams in order to fully integrate a participatory and community-based focus within our within our programmatic strategies. I think that it is possible to expand the impact of this program through the integration of talented local actors. I hope that in the coming years, we can establish clear alliances between local actors in order to incorporate amaranth within the family, community, and inter-community daily lives.
In conclusion, I am a witness of how Puente’s vision is leading to further solidarity and responsibility within the organization. We fully expect that our revised five-year strategic plan will continue to meet the expectations of the actors whom will be ultimately left to lead its implementation in the rural communities of Oaxaca."
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Highlights of Puente's Achievements From
2009
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120% increase
in amaranth production from 2008!
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The Healthy Families Program offered amaranth workshops to the mothers of 2,000 at-risk children in rural Oaxaca
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The Eco-Amaranth Program worked with 221 farmers to cultivate amaranth using sustainable and ecological practices.
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Community level capacity building: Puente
trained and coordinated with four local amaranth promoters. The promoters provide valuable local knowledge, speak the local indigenous languages, and inject fantastic energy to further promote the responsible production and consumption of amaranth.
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Puente a la Salud Comunitaria also received the Award for
Excellence from the Pan American Health and Education Foundation in recognition of our work in public health and to improving the
lives of the people of the Americas.
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To find out how you can help Puente make a difference, please click here.
To make a secure, online donation:
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Join Puente's cause on Facebook by clicking here and searching for "Friends of Puente." We look forward to seeing you on Facebook!
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Puente is a
registered US 501(c)(3) public charity dedicated to improving the health of rural communities in Oaxaca, Mexico. All donations made to Puente
are tax deductible.
For more information about Puente's work, e-mail us at info@puentemexico.org. We
would love to hear from you!
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