16 posts categorized "Field Focus"

Sharmila Chaudhari feeds her daughter Sanjana, 19 months, at the Nutrition Rehabilitation Home (NRH) in Dhangadhi, Nepal, on Sunday, April 29, 2012. This Nutrition Rehabilitation Home in the western part of the country is run by an NGO in Nepal called the Rural Women's Development and Unity Centre (RUWDUC). Children eat meals and snacks at 7 a.m., 10 a.m., 1 p.m., 4 p.m., and 7 p.m., and they drink milk at 10 p.m., 1 a.m., and 4 a.m.

Forty-one percent of Nepali children under age 5 are short for their age (stunted), according to the preliminary 2011 Nepal Demographic and Health Survey. Stunting is an indicator of malnutrition, so ensuring children are properly nourished in the 1,000 days between pregnancy and age 2 is vital to a child’s development.

Photo by Laura Elizabeth Pohl/Bread for the World

Mukul Begum, a shasthya shebika (community health worker) for BRAC, stands in front of her home in Barisal, Bangladesh. Begum delivers basic health care, counseling, and treatment to people in her community.

Text by Molly Marsh / Photos by Laura Elizabeth Pohl

BARISAL, BANGLADESH---Mukul Begum reaches into a plastic jar for tuberculosis medicine and brings it to 70-year-old Amjed Ali Sikder, who sits on a bench outside her front door. She pours a glass of water from a clear pitcher, watching closely as he puts the pill in his mouth and swallows it. Satisfied, she gives him the water.

Begum, 37, is a shasthya shebika, one of about 80,000 health workers trained by BRAC, an international nongovernmental organization, to deliver basic health care, counseling, and treatment to people in their communities. BRAC’s social, health, and economic empowerment programs operate in each of Bangladesh’s 64 districts, reaching about 110 million people.

Shasthya shebikas such as Begum are the engines of BRAC’s work—in 2010, they treated 1,650,673 people, the vast majority in rural areas where medical information and care is limited.

For five years, Begum—a formidable but jolly woman—has made door-to-door visits to counsel people in Barisal, a district of Bangladesh, about safe sanitation, basic hygiene, and nutrition. She currently looks after 263 households; 2 percent of these receive what BRAC calls “Directly Observed Treatment Short-Course.” In other words, if Sikder hadn’t come to her house to take his medicine, she would have gone to his to make sure he took it.

People in the community also visit Begum’s house, a low concrete building that sits under a thick canopy of coconut trees, for help with a variety of ailments. Begum listens and then reaches for a shasthya shebika’s constant companion—a small blue plastic bowl that holds medicine for fever, dysentery, diarrhea, gastric ulcers, skin diseases, and allergic reactions. It also contains home pregnancy tests and pills for calcium, vitamin B, and birth control.

Begum purchases the medicine from her local BRAC office, which she can then sell to her patients at a slight profit. She also receives money when pregnant mothers deliver their babies in a hospital or when patients complete treatment—for example, she’ll receive 500 taka (about $6.50) when Sikdar finishes his 6-month treatment for tuberculosis.

Before they embark on their caregiving, shasthya shebikas receive 15 days of training at a BRAC learning center on health basics and communicable diseases. They also gather for refresher classes once a month, in which they and shasthya kormis (health supervisors) review training themes and discuss issues that have arisen in their communities. Shasthya shebikas also meet once a month with a BRAC manager to report their activities.

It’s a role Begum seems to enjoy. “In the community, people believe I’m a doctor,” she said through a translator. She stands in her front doorway; behind her a clothesline stretches down the hallway, filled with colorful clothes. To the left of her house sits a small shack with items for sale, including toilet paper, candy, bread, and snacks.

BRAC’s main health program, called Essential Health Care, targets poor people—especially women and children—with medical care using seven different components. They include programs that focus on malaria, tuberculosis, and vision problems, and on the needs of pregnant mothers, infants, and children.

Shasthya shebikas are critical to each of these efforts, in many cases receiving additional training to be able to diagnose and treat malaria, for example, or identify vision problems. Begum and others are the front line of care in their communities—not just in dispensing medicine but also referring people to clinics when ailments are beyond their expertise.

Molly Marsh is managing editor and Laura Elizabeth Pohl is multimedia manager at Bread for the World. You can follow Laura on Twitter at @lauraepohl.

Tohomina Akter washes pots and dishes in a pond near her home on the morning of Thursday, April 19, 2012, in Char Baria village, Barisal, in southern Bangladesh. Tohomina participates in a maternal and infant nutrition program called Nobo Jibon administered by Helen Keller International. The program stresses proper nutrition in young children.

Photographs by Laura Elizabeth Pohl / Text by Molly Marsh

BARISAL, BANGLADESH---The afternoon hours are Tohomino Akter’s favorite time of day. That’s when she can take a break from her household tasks, rest, and play with her 17-month-old daughter, Adia. Like any toddler, Adia much prefers movement.

Adia runs through the four rooms of their home, her pink sundress and plastic pink shoes contrasting against the gray tin walls. First is her parent’s bedroom, then the room where her father’s parents and brothers sleep. Then a small room that contains clothes and dishes, and finally the kitchen, a skinny corridor that opens to the outside on one end, where her mother prepares their food over a fire.

Adia stops suddenly at the front steps, looking out at the familiar faces of Char Baria, a village in the Barisal district of Bangladesh. In front of her lies Tohomino’s garden, a 25-foot square of spinach, amaranth, chili, and pepper plants, an important source of nutrients for Adia and her family. Spinach and red amarinthe are Adia’s favorites.

Tohomino planted the garden after receiving training in “Nobo Jibon,” a program administered by Helen Keller International, a nongovernmental organization that works in several Bangladesh districts. The vegetables she harvests have increased the nutrients available to her family, especially her daughter. What’s more, the extra money the family earns selling the surplus vegetables goes toward buying additional food for Adia.

In the program, Tohomino learned why a diverse, healthy diet is important, and also about the importance of breast-feeding her daughter. Tohomino attended classes for almost two months, hearing from health workers the benefits of giving Adia only breast milk during her first six months of life.

Tohomino has stuck to that schedule, introducing supplementary foods only after the initial six-month period, and she’ll continue to breast-feed Adia until she is 2.

“I did not do many things [before taking the class],” Tohomino said through a translator. “But after learning, I am keeping things clean and hygienic to prevent diseases, and cooking nutritious foods to keep me and my family healthy.”

Tohomina Akter grows amaranth, spinach, peppers and other vegetables in her garden. The vegetables are enough to feed her family and have enough left over to sell in the local market.

The neighborhood well is a 30-second walk from Tohomina Akter's home. Here she rinses vegetables with the help of Khaleda Begum (right).

Tohomina Akter prepares spinach and borboti, a long bean, in her family's kitchen as her 17-month-old daughter Adia attempts to help her.

Dry leaves fuel the fire in Tohomina Akter's kitchen.

Tohomina Akter feeds her 17-month-old daughter Adia. The nutrition programTohomina participates in stresses exclusive breast-feeding until six months and breast-feeding plus supplementary feeding from six months until 24 months.

Neighbors stop by Tohomina Akter's kitchen to talk.

Adia, 17 months, is reluctant to be washed by her mother.

Tohomina Akter cleans herself at the neighborhood well.

After washing herself and her daughter, Tohomina Akter attempts to dress a squirming daughter Adia, 17 months.

Molly Marsh is managing editor and Laura Elizabeth Pohl is multimedia manager at Bread for the World. You can follow Laura on Twitter at @lauraepohl.

As a fan of poetry, I often wish I had the writing talent of a poet. I admire how poets can bring readers into the world of their subjects, without the excess of prose, straight to the heart of a story, issue, or perspective with one perfect line of description.

At Bread for the World, we are constantly wondering how we can evoke the imaginations of people who might not fully understand the danger that some people on the brink of poverty experience daily. That's why we share stories of people we meet along the way who have been there -- people who have fought tooth and nail to scrape together enough money to buy some food for themselves and their kids.

With that in mind, I thought I'd go out on a limb here and share this poem with you called "Short-Order Cook," by Jim Daniels. It depicts a short-order cook at a diner, but speaks to the daily fight some of us go through to overcome great obstacles.

Take some time to read the poem, and share your own favorite poem in the comments section below.

Short-Order Cook
Jim Daniels (b. 1956)

Jeannie Choi is associate editor at Bread for the World.

I am terrible at grasping scale. Ask me how many people were at a concert and I couldn't tell you if it was 1,000 or 10,000. So when I try to conceive of 7 billion people living on this earth, it's enough to give me a splitting headache.

But this is an important concept for all of us to understand. Why? Because 7 billion people means that the hunger crisis in our global community has the potential to get worse. According to a United Nations report, the expected growth has increased concern that the number of hungry and poor people around the world will rise, particiularly as grain and global food prices continue to increase. 

This NPR video provides a visual demonstration of how population growth was accomplished in some countries struggling to survive. It's fascinating to note that food, medicine, and better health care--essentially, higher standards of living--are able to stop the constant "drip" of death, disease, and starvation in developing nations.

And that is what our goal should be. I celebrate our growing planet, and I hope that this will only encourage globally conscious people to fight even harder to keep foreign aid and poverty-focused development assistance in our nation's federal budget. 

+Act now and protect foreign aid for hungry people around the world.

Watch the video below, and share your thoughts in the comments section:

Jeannie Choi is associate editor at Bread for the World.

Bread for the World Librarian Chris Matthews curates a list of resources for readers who want to stay on top of the latest information about hunger.

In this next installment of hunger resources, I've gathered a collection of articles on how people suffer from hunger and the overall cost of hunger in a society. Got any hunger resources of your own? Share them in the comments section below.

• On the Brink:  Who’s Best Prepared for a Climate and Hunger Crisis?  (Casey, Leora and Alex Wijeratna. Actionaid, Oct. 2011):
  "Accelerating climate change, growing population and rising food prices pose a triple crisis that could lead to a collapse in global food systems."

• Right to Food and Nutrition Watch 2011.  Claiming Human Rights:  The Accountability Challenge.  (Brot fur die Welt, FIAN and ICCO, Oct. 11, 2011)
  "Despite the growth of a worldwide Right to Food movement and the existence of international frameworks and mechanisms to protect human rights, an unacceptable number of violations remain unpunished, according to the Right to Food and Nutrition Watch 2011, an annual publication released today that monitors food security and nutrition policies from a human rights perspective." 

•  Food Sovereignty:  Reclaiming the Global Food System. (Branford, Sue. War on Want, Oct. 2011.)
   "The scandal of global hunger stands as a rebuke to humanity. The fact that record numbers of people are classified as hungry, at a time when there is unprecedented wealth in theworld, challenges the very concept of human progress."

• Farmers Facing Loss of Subsidy May Get New One (Neuman, William, New York Times, Oct. 17, 2011)
  "It seems a rare act of civic sacrifice: in the name of deficit reduction, lawmakers from both parties are calling for the end of a longstanding agricultural subsidy that puts about $5 billion a year in the pockets of their farmer constituents. Even major farm groups are accepting the move, saying that with farmers poised to reap bumper profits, they must do their part."

• Hunger In America:  Suffering We All Pay For (Shepard, Donald S … et al, Center for American Progress & Brandeis University, Oct. 2011)
  "The Great Recession and the currently tepid economic recovery swelled the ranks of American households confronting hunger and food insecurity by 30 percent. In 2010 48.8 million Americans lived in food insecure households, meaning they were hungry or faced food insecurity at some point during the year."

• Interactive Map:  Costs of Hunger (Cooper, Donna, Center for America Progress, Oct. 4, 2011)
  An interactive map on the costs of hunger created by the Center for American Progress. 

+Click here for a full list of what we're reading at Bread for the World.

Chris Matthews is the librarian at Bread for the World Institute.

When God calls us to “open wide” our hands to the needy and poor in our land (Deuteronomy 15) and pour ourselves out for the hungry (Isaiah 58), God leaves the specifics up to us. We can respond in myriad ways: We can attend rallies, write letters, make calls, and arrange meetings with our legislators. We can give to aid organizations, donate to the food pantry, or volunteer at the local soup kitchen. 

We can even take those dictates literally by actually sharing a meal with hungry people. For example, in Cambridge I’ve had the pleasure of befriending Engio, who has a predilection for cheeseburgers; Mike, who likes to eat chicken fried rice with his hands; and Harold, a gourmand who loves to make his own pizza—and who was so aghast at my weekly spam and rice dinners that he once surprised me with a grocery bag full of fresh foods, including fruit, pie, and pre-cooked chicken wings. “Anything but spam, please!” he said. Given his nonexistent income, I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. 

Yet most of these responses, at least for me, preclude participation from my large and rather diverse network of friends. Few—including myself, I admit—are super excited to give up part of their workday to visit their senators or representative at the local office, for example. Food pantries can accommodate only so many volunteers each evening, and outside of church and campus, there are few natural opportunities to organize an Offering of Letters. 

As I celebrated my 26^th birthday this year, however, I decided to put another spin on responding biblically to hunger by fusing fun with purpose: I threw a huge party. 

At 26, there was surprisingly little on my birthday wish list—AmeriCorps stipend and food stamps notwithstanding—though I admit it helps that God has blessed me with relatively good health and a childlike affinity for low-cost activities, such as kite-flying and playing with the local stray cat, Mr. Tinkles. Besides, I had already managed to procure animal crackers, juice boxes, and even my favorite dessert—pecan pie—for my “Back to Childhood”-themed birthday party. 

Instead of asking for presents or cards, I invited my friends to come bearing costumes and a different kind of gift—a letter for their senator or representative advocating for the prioritization and reform of foreign aid. I tracked their gifts on a Google doc I shared with them and, for those who hadn’t had time to write their letters, set up a letter-writing station right next to our face-painting station and our smorgasbord of Yoohoos, Twizzlers, and Junior Scrabble Cheez-its. (I admit that the childhood theme doesn’t make for the healthiest party foods.)

With preprinted letter templates, pens, and paper, all it took was five minutes for my friends to handwrite a letter. In the end, I collected a whopping 30 letters from friends across six different states. 

My party took place the day before my actual birthday, and I ended up spending much of my birthday tracking their letters, stuffing envelopes, looking up mailing addresses, and placing adhesive stamps—all over bites of leftover pecan pie, of course. 

And in the end, I couldn’t have imagined a more meaningful way to celebrate turning 26. 

Ada Wan is a Bread for the World Hunger Justice Leader from Cambridge, Massachusetts. 

Text by Dulce Gamboa
Photographs by Laura Elizabeth Pohl

It has been almost 10 years since Marvin Garcia returned to Mexico from the United States. Garcia, 52, is originally from Guatemala but is now a naturalized Mexican citizen. He owns and farms a small parcel of land at Santa Fe, a sustainable community developed by Agros International in Comitan, located in Mexico’s Chiapas state.

 
Marvin Garcia, 52, worked in the United States without papers several times because of a lack of opportunities and jobs where he lives in Chiapas, Mexico. With the help of Agros, a U.S. nonprofit, Garcia was able to buy land in his hometown when he returned from the United States.

Agros helps poor small-scale farmers buy fertile land with loans that carry a very low interest rate. Borrowers have up to 10 years to repay their loans. Agros also provides technical assistance to help farmers make the land as productive as possible.

Garcia is a resilient man who is partially blind from cataracts. It is too painful for him to open his right eye. Using just one eye is especially hard during harvest season. He said once, “I think that the corn I am scorching is right in front of me, but it’s not.” He was making fun of himself but he was also sad.

He has overcome a lot of obstacles over the years--from fleeing to Mexico as a Guatemalan refugee, to crossing the U.S. border through the deserts of Arizona. And even with one eye, Garcia continues to fight for a better life for his six-member family.

Garcia moved to the United States because of the lack of opportunities and sources of income at home. He wanted to pursue his dream of someday building a house. Between 1998 and 2000, Garcia crossed the U.S.-Mexican border four times. Leaving his family behind was not easy, and he remembers this as a bitter and difficult time.

 
Marvin and his son Jesús, 4, eat a breakfast of tortilla and beans before heading to the field for the day. 

Garcia worked in Florida, growing and picking tomatoes. For months, he ate nothing but one apple a day so he could save money. He managed to set aside almost an entire year’s salary ($12,000) to build his house. Garcia estimates that earning that much money in Mexico would have taken him seven to eight years, always assuming good harvests. After enduring separation from his family, Garcia now owns a modest house with a latrine.

For years, Garcia tried to buy land in Chiapas, but the federal government repeatedly denied his application. He finally got involved with Agros in 2007, and a year later he obtained his land at Santa Fe. His life was transformed. As he explains, “It’s not the same to rent or borrow land to grow for selling or self-consumption.”

After two years of becoming part of the Santa Fe community, Garcia is certain that with hard work, he can make his land productive enough to repay his loan from Agros within the allotted 10 years. He feels very proud of being able to purchase the land, where he grows corn and lime.

 
Garcia harvests corn, mushrooms, coffee and limes among other products.

Garcia does not have plans to migrate to the United States again, because his future in Mexico is now brighter. He has his land to work. Within a few years, he may be able to save the $1,500 he needs for cataract surgery. He is a role model in his community.

Garcia’s story shows that investing in Mexico’s rural development is critical to easing pressures to migrate to the United States. Santa Fe is a community of men, women, and children. It is not a village of grandparents taking care of their grandchildren because a whole generation is missing—forced to seek work far from home. Santa Fe is a community with a sense of hope and confidence that residents will be able to pay Agros back for the land where they grow tomatoes, corn, onions, papayas, and more. After decades of lack of opportunities to earn a living, the men in this community no longer think about migrating to the United States. They feel confident about being able to feed their families. Thanks to Agros and its funders, Marvin Garcia and his neighbors have the possibility of development in their own hands.  


Garcia, Jesús and their dog Chiquita walk home from the family cornfield.

by Rebecca J. Vander Meulen

LICHINGA, MOZAMBIQUE — Today is the day when people around the world recognize our common daily work (which is—in a country where most families include someone living with HIV—our daily life). It is my eighth World AIDS Day in Mozambique, and I sense that in addition to being older and wiser, we're also all getting a bit tired. We see that, as a country, we've made incredible progress (best encapsulated by the emergence of widespread access to testing and later to treatment).

But our starting point was abysmally low: more than a million people living with HIV, with most not even knowing it. So, despite progress, we still have a really long way to go. The "low-lying fruit" has been picked, and now we're in for a marathon.

Access to testing and treatment is still light-years away from being "universal," but I'd venture a non-statistical guess that most Mozambicans could at least get to a testing site within a day's travel—and could theoretically get treatment just as easily.

Access to treatment, however, assumes the motivation to do an HIV test; money and time for travel; a steady stock of HIV drugs at the level of the health post (which depends on a steady stock of HIV drugs at the district and provincial levels, as well); regular enough immune system monitoring for the person living with HIV to have actually begun treatment (treatment initiation does not normally coincide with a positive test result); thorough enough adherence counseling for the person living with HIV to know and actually believe that taking the ARV medication without fail over a lifetime is critical for drug effectiveness; and enough self-confidence to overcome the shame that still too commonly clings to HIV. Quite a few assumptions.

We celebrate that Amelia, now 12, is healthy enough (after several years on HIV medication) that she's been able to come off additional medications used to prevent opportunistic infections. Her own immune system is doing its job quite well! We celebrate that she's comfortable enough with her HIV status that she comes to have blood work done with a group of friends.

But we mourn that children born to ashamed HIV+ mothers—including one who died in my colleague's arms last month—still do not live to speak their own names.

We celebrate new technology, which allows sophisticated lab analyses to be done using solar power in remote areas.

But we mourn stories that, in some areas, understanding and acceptance of HIV are still so fragile that basic HIV testing kits expire before being used, and that the health posts return their boxes of condoms, unopened and unwanted, to the provincial health department.

We celebrate Raquel, Melinda, Alberta, and India, just a few of many agents of community transformation.

But we mourn the challenges that HIV has brought to each of them. One of them, having cared for several orphaned children for many years, has had to fight against strong protests from her husband to do so. One has lost her husband to death (presumably associated with AIDS), now lives with HIV, and is actively fighting for everyone in her community to get an HIV test. Another has had a marriage destroyed by HIV and related accusations, but now travels from community to community to get mak sure church women know how HIV is transmitted and how it can be prevented.

Many of our 4,000 community volunteers gathered to celebrate and study today. But others—more practically and immediately concerned about having food to eat this year, and compelled by the season's first solid rain last night—opted to spend the day preparing fields for planting.

One of Mozambique's national World AIDS Day mottos this year was "Look to the future. Get a test." We mourn that in many parts of Mozambique, food is still a more tangible preoccupation than HIV.

Thank you for recognizing with us December 1—a New Year's Day of sorts for those of us whose lives are shaped by this little virus.

Things truly are changing. Passo a passo. Step by step.

Rebecca J. Vander Meulen, a former Bread for the World intern, is the HIV and AIDS coordinator for the Anglican Diocese of  Niassa in Lichinga, Mozambique.

By Lauren Tonetti, California Organizing Intern and student at Pomona College

A few weeks ago, I had an opportunity to listen in on a panel discussion about hunger.  The event took place at First United Methodist Church in Pasadena.  David Beckmann, Bread’s president, started the evening with his thoughts on how God is moving in our time to end hunger.  He was followed by a discussion with prominent faith and justice leaders in the Los Angeles Area.  Panelists included: Vanessa Martinez, CLUE Orange County and Micah Challenge; Sarah Nolan, Abundant Table Farm Project and South Central Farmers’ Cooperative; Rev. Pat O’Reilly from the Ecumenical Council of Pasadena Area Churches and Jeremy Seifert, the producer of the film DIVE!

This was an awesome opportunity to hear a wide range of voices on hunger in America. Despite these varied points of view there are some things that have really stuck with me and I think are important to share. 

1. This is a time of great liberation. As I mentioned before, David Beckman started the panel by impressing upon us that God is working in our time. That we are living in a time where we can witness freedom from hunger and poverty in the world. I find such hope in this. The state of hunger in the world is bleak at times and it seems like there will never be change. But take heart, because God is working. These are issues that He cares deeply about and He is creating a path for liberation. God is working and we just have to join with God to end hunger.

2. We need to reorder relationships. This was a point that came up multiple times throughout the discussion. We live in a world full of chaos and confusion. Relationships to others and to the world are distorted. We see other people not as partners or equals but rather as objects. There is a lack of concern towards others and the earth. Hunger is not just about access to food but access to good food. Our relationship to creation has been distorted by the ways we produce and consume our food. Large corporations abuse the land and their workers and hurt smaller farmers. In order to end hunger we need to start viewing others like they are a part of our own family. We need to start caring for the earth and about the way we produce food. We need to encourage greater access and make sure everyone is getting what they need.

3. There needs to be a revolution of the heart.  This last point I want to highlight touches not only on hunger but on the many issues we face. Ending hunger or poverty or war is going to happen through policy or politics alone. We need to start caring. Our hearts will naturally care only for ourselves. We have very private interests and concerns. In order to break down the problems of the world we need to open our hearts. We need to start caring for everyone and take action even when the outcome won’t always help us. Without this kind of love and dedication to others no amount of petitioning or lobbying is going to help. Having a deep love for others and for God is what change is predicated upon.

Finally, I want to challenge everyone who reads this to think about what their hearts find important and worthy. Is it all about you and your gain?  Is there room for others? If you feel like joining this revolution of the heart I want to encourage you to take action. Turn that love into change. 

Write a letter or call congress. Get educated on the issues. Pray about the change you want to see. I fully believe what David Beckman said when he told us that we are living in a time of great liberation. I have faith that God is working and that if we join together we’ll all see the benefits of freedom. 

David Beckmann is speaking with Cameron Shaw, Pomona College graduate 2009 and former Bread intern.