The Early Bird...

Today I thought I would have the privilege to sleep in. I stayed the night at the Morelia caracol and I slept in a hammock in a cabin shared with the DESMI staff. The DESMI staff had to wake up early as their workshops were going to start at 6am. I watched them all leave from my hammock.

Then Rosaluz came in and said, "I tried to come last night to talk to you but the lights were out."

"Yes, that's right. The DESMI staff wanted to sleep because they had to wake up early today," I responded as I snuggled in my hammock.

"Well, I wanted to tell you that the Junta would like you to talk to the women artisans."

"Oh, that's great. When would they like to get together?"

"The women decided they want to talk to you before the DESMI workshop."

"Oh, that workshop starts at 6am." Then it suddenly sunk in. "That means they want to talk to me now?"

"Um... yes."

So much for sleeping in!

When I entered the training hall, the women artisans were already waiting for me. They started the meeting by welcoming me and asked me to talk about my visit.

All these women are representatives, chosen by their communities to be responsible for coming to the trainings and then inform the rest on how the cooperative is coming about. In fact, the women have just started this process and after talking to me, they will continue their training on what constitutes a cooperative.

This group is unique as they are the first group of artisans who have decided to become an autonomous cooperative. This means that they don't have to go through the long legal process that is required when registering with the governmental system. Instead, they need to be recognized by the Junta (Good Governance Council). Nevertheless, they want to create a cooperative that is legitimate, so they are taking the positive parts of what is usually required to have a cooperative.

I asked them what was their dream of having this cooperative, why did they want to form it. After some silence, one artisan spoke out:

"Our dream to have a cooperative is to be united. We are all trying to sell our products in the market to earn some money but we don't want to compete with each other. We don't want one municipality to sell more than the other. (The cooperative has members from 7 municipalities and 4 regions.) Instead, we want to unite so that the money can be distributed to everyone."

I could tell that not all the women were jumping to talk openly, except the coordinator who was doing a great job leading and encouraging the group while she tried to comfort her baby at the same time. But the fact that they are all participating in this workshop speaks a thousand words.

The women are here because they want to be here. This is a workshop that they have asked to have and not because it is being offered by an organization. You can tell the difference as I can see that even the quiet ones are paying close attention.

This cooperative is ambitious, trying to include indigenous women who speak different Mayan languages and Spanish. But it is their decision as a group to create this cooperative and apparently that communication among them has been very clear!

Kat

Trip to Morelia

I am sitting among the beautiful green trees and mountains. The sky is very clear today. You wouldn't have guessed that the night before Hurricane Dean had gone over the Yucatan peninsula.

I am waiting to meet the Good Governance Council (Junta de Buen Gobierno) in the caracol (regional center) of Morelia. I came in the morning with a group of 4 staff members of DESMI. They have been invited to give workshops to community members in agroecology, organic fertilizers, cooperative management and cattle rearing. I am here with Rosaluz from Enlace Civil to meet the Council members that are in charge of the plan of production (focusing on food security and arts and crafts). IDEX is supporting specifically the group of women artisans who are starting an autonomous cooperative to build the capacity to market their textile products.

Each caracol has its own security commission, which receives every guest who enters the premises. They then make an appointment with the Council. I am already participating in this alternative governance system.

Right now it seems that there is a conflict that has occurred in a nearby municipality and it is taking the Council a long time to resolve. I might not get to meet the Council before lunch.

After some beans and tortillas...
The Council has received me and has asked me to explain the reason of my visit. They welcome me and tell me that this is my home too. They ask whether I have a space to spend the night and if I had eaten. It is nice to know that even though this is all a procedure that the communities have created, it feels like a genuine service to all people who enter this place.

I then went to meet a Commission of the plan of production, which includes IDEX's support to the artisans cooperative. The Commission has just formed as the plan is too big and required a separate commitment by the Council. It was an interesting dialogue where I explained what IDEX was and they told me about their plans and hopes for this project.

From the meeting I could instantly tell that this was a project that has ownership amongst the people themselves. This project was planned and initiated by them and now they are building their capacity to see the project through with the support of Enlace Civil. It is a constant support that encourages professional development as Enlace Civil helps them administratively such as guiding the financial administrator to practice Excel to track the funds.

These people have been chosen by the communities to be in this commission and Enlace Civil is giving them the basic skills to govern their people and to help them improve their quality of lives.

You can't come here and not feel that people have taken ownership of their own governance and that this is all done with the goal of providing a better future for their communities.

Microcredit in Chiapas

Katherine, with Toño, DESMI's Director

When I entered DESMI's office, I thought to myself, "I want to work here!" DESMI's office is in a beautiful colonial house with a huge garden, which they have owned since 1979. I knew several of DESMI's staff from my IDEX trip to Guatemala last year, so seeing them again felt like seeing old friends.

Sitting down with the staff on my office visit, DESMI taught me a lot about their programs, and specifically their microcredit program. DESMI works in 3 regional areas in Chiapas: North, South and Los Altos. Currently, they have one person managing each regional area but they are in a process of staff restructuring to see if there is a way to better facilitate the work in these areas by distributing the responsibility.

I found DESMI's microcredit program very interesting. DESMI's loan fund will only be distributed to collectives. The whole process from the moment the community applies for microcredit to receiving it may take 2 to 3 months, as DESMI wants to ensure that the microcredit they receive will guarantee success of their project. There hasn't been a case where DESMI has rejected an application. Instead, if something doesn't make sense or the application is not complete, DESMI's staff will take the time to visit the collective and work together on the application. Every first Monday of the month, DESMI's staff sits down together to look at all the applications. Since 2003, they have not received many applications.

DESMI expressed to me their excitement on the exchange trip they're doing next week together with K'inal Antsetik to visit IDEX's Guatemalan partners: AFEDES, APROSADSE and ISMU, as well as other organizations. They are planning to visit AFEDES' Weavers' Store in Santiago Sacatepequez and APROSADSE's agricultural program in Chimaltenango.

DESMI is hoping to learn especially how these organizations work with gender issues into their programs, since DESMI is also initiating their own workshops on masculinity. These exchange trips, organized by IDEX partners themselves, came about during IDEX's regional conference in Antigua, Guatemala in January 2006. IDEX's partners decided they wanted to exchange experiences as they saw that they all were facing similar challenges although living in different political and cultural contexts.

IDEX has been a long supporter of DESMI and it's easy to see why. DESMI is continually working to become more efficient in their site visits, training and in being more aware of the needs of the communities. DESMI is currently working on developing a monitoring and evaluation plan to ensure they are achieving the objectives they have set themselves to accomplish."It hasn't been successful yet, to be honest," Toño, DESMI's Director tells me, "but we are doing our best to get this plan together because we want to make sure that DESMI is working well to improve the quality of life of these communities."

Kat

Growing Mushrooms

Today I went to San Rafael, a community near Comitán to visit a training workshop that IDEX partner, DESMI, was facilitating together with the collective living there.

San Rafael's collective is a new group that started one year ago with DESMI. In this brief period, they have already established their own training center that teaches community members in the region how to grow a type of mushroom called zeto.

When I got there, they were already sowing the mushroom seed in bags filled with olote (corn without their kernels). The training had started yesterday and I was joining them in their last phase. They encouraged me to participate and it looked like fun, so I did. I felt like a surgeon as I wore my mask, hat and latex gloves. The gear was to help prevent contamination on the seeds, so they can grow better. Once the bag of seeds with olotes was completed, it was placed in a separate dark room covered with plastic to foment the mushroom to grow.

After the training workshop the trainees, two of DESMI staff and I sat down together and had a good talk about their experience in working collectively, the projects they're working on and their hopes for their communities. The trainees were representative leaders that their communities had elected to promote organic agriculture. When I asked them what their hopes were for themselves and their communities, many responded that they wanted health among community members to improve and that everyone should have a balanced diet. One young man, promoter of organic agriculture in the community of Nuevo Tepeyac said, "I'm hoping to change the world." Everyone cried in unison that this was really the ultimate goal, to show that there is a better way to live in this world.

Don Juan, member of San Rafael's collective, used to own the land where the training center now stands. He sold the land to the collective so that the center could be owned and used by the collective members. He offered to show me his plot of land after the meeting, where he just harvested his milpas (corn). He's been practicing organic agriculture for 4 years now. Everything he grows has been primarily for his family's consumption, and whatever remains, is sold at the central market in Comitán.

It was a great experience to be among the people at the training today. All of them had the intention to go back to their communities to demonstrate how to grow mushrooms and if they are motivated enough, San Rafael's collective will go directly to them to train them and give suggestions. A couple of the trainees today were 14-year-old, young girls, who are already working to support their community.

They have all shown how much they care for their land, for their Mother Earth. They've all come here to be part of something bigger, because they want a better life, a better world for themselves and their communities. One cannot help but witness their dedication to achieve this wonderful goal!

Kat