This project is done in partnership with Oxfam America.

The Training Institute for Sustainable Development (IEPADES), founded in 1991, works for peace and democracy in Guatemala, with an emphasis on social justice and community-based organizing. IEPADES empowers local communities through programs focused on gender, specifically women’s participation and influence in social, political and economically; the prevention of violence against women; community savings programs; and sustainable agricultural development. These programs recognize that women are essential to the livelihoods and food security of Guatemalan families and therefore seek to engage women as key players in rural development.

One of its initiatives is a community savings program, which brings women together to pool their savings. The women then lend each other money for investments such as thread for weaving, ducks and seeds, which will help the women generate income. This has already proven to be a powerful program, but this project can have an even greater effect if IEPADES is better able to communicate the work they do and engage community members, not only in the community savings program but also their gender and food security initiatives, which are mutually reinforcing. As a result, IEPADES is working with ArtCorps to develop women’s leadership, team work and communication skills, which can enhance IEPADES’ community savings, food security and gender initiatives.  Through workshops, trainings, and community-led initiatives, ArtCorps will transfer knowledge and skills to staff and women leaders.

Scholarly research and conventional wisdom tell us that women matter and that their leadership can make a difference at the household, community and global levels. As half of the world’s population, women can have a particularly profound effect on household income, with the potential for a significant contribution to household health, education and food security. In rural Guatemala women are essential to household income, as 45% of Guatemalan women work and15% of households are headed by women. However, despite making up a significant part of the workforce, Guatemalan women face numerous challenges to leveraging their income to improve their livelihood security. This lack of social and economic empowerment translates into lost opportunities for women to contribute to sustainable development outcomes in high priority areas.

In particular, improved livelihood security can make a significant impact in food security and nutrition. Malnutrition and chronic food shortages are not unusual in Guatemala. Lack of investment in small-scale agriculture has reduced food production over the years, and the country now has the highest rate of malnutrition among children under five in Latin America: nearly 50 percent, according to the World Food Program. The malnutrition rate for indigenous children is higher; close to 70 percent. For families that rely heavily on agriculture for their livelihoods, as is the case in most rural Guatemalan communities, fluctuations in rainfall can be catastrophic because too little or too much rain result in low crop yields. During these times, families without social safety nets such as access to credit struggle to provide food and shelter for family members.

2011: ArtCorps Artist Sandra Cornejo, a Salvadoran-American visual artist, has been involved in community outreach programs for all ages while living in Richmond, as well as internationally. Most recently, she co-directed a multi-media project with inner-city children through Art180, a Richmond-based non-profit organization that believes every child can create change by sharing their stories through art. She has worked for many summers in El Salvador at the Latin American Community Arts Project, a grassroots organization that promotes inter-cultural awareness through community arts workshops.

• Workshops for Creativity and Leadership: Workshops for 23 female community savings promoters in five different regions that use pottery, drawing and painting, weaving, muraling and theater to develop self-esteem, creative thinking and leadership.
• Developing Team Work Through the Arts: Building team work and leadership among IEPADES staff by painting murals together throughout the IEPADES office that focus on community savings and food security.
• Women’s Festival: Collaborating with the IEPADES staff to organize a women’s festival in the central plaza during which women will sell products and learn about the community savings program.
• Charlas con la Chana: Discussions within the IEPADES team to share skills and knowledge they have on topics such as popular education, art, environment and gender.
• Signs for Awareness: ArtCorps will collaborate with staff and the communities where they work to design and create signs in the communities that raise awareness about the community savings and food security work done by IEPADES.