In addition, ERD is working on agricultural development programs in several communities.  In two communities, ERD will help strengthen and support the formation of cooperatives and implement marketing strategies.  In the third, ERD is focusing on cummunity gardening as a means of food security for an urban shantytown where unemployment is rampant.  In the regional capital of Santa Maria, a community gardening project will use church property to develop community gardens whose vegetables and medicinal plants can be used for consumption or sale.  The program will encourage micro businesses, develop marketing plans, and institute courses in nutrition and health and its link to the vegetables and medicinal plants being produced.

Democratic Republic of Congo
Food security for rural populations:
ERD is working with the Diocese of Kantanga to increase food security for communities.  ERD will support income-generating activities and co-op formation for women and households supporting orphans or vulnerable children.  Technical training for target communities in advanced farming methods, crop diversification, crop cultivation and water management will be provided.

El Salvador
Providing food security for families:
ERD is helping people living on less than US$2/day in 28 rural communities in Eastern El Salvador through a project that addresses problems such as: unemployment, lack of family income, low levels of land ownership, low crop yields, high costs of agricultural inputs, lack of local marketing support, lack of technical knowledge, poor access to practical methods of adding value to crops, and lack of access to social services. ERD is providing micro loans to help people start businesses so they can break out of poverty. Businesses started to date include tortilla making, garment work, fruit juice stands, a day care center, and small restaurants, among others. ERD is also beginning a 3-year food security program using community women’s groups to introduce vegetable gardening for household consumption and commercial sale.

Haiti
Providing food security for people in poverty:
ERD’s food security program gives people living in poverty the skills, training, and education they need so they can earn money and support their families. ERD and the Diocese of Haiti are building the Bishop Tharp Business and Technology Institute in Les Cayes, Haiti’s second largest city. The goal is to produce skilled technicians who participate in creating new businesses in Les Cayes and fill mid-to senior-level positions with local companies. By developing a pool of educated and skilled workers, the Institute’s business management and computer technology programs will have a profound impact on the entire Les Cayes region. A broader goal is to attract new businesses to the region and bring further opportunities for economic development.

During and following the post-coup crisis period, ERD has continued to help the Diocese with food security interventions and emergency assistance in areas where the church can make a difference. As food supplies in Haiti became scarcer, ERD helped arrange shipments of rice and cooking oil for distribution by parishes to needy communities in western and southern Haiti, specifically in the Leogane and Port-au-Prince areas. We also provided funds for clothing, emergency food, shelter and education needs of vulnerable populations in the Artibonite and northern regions, centered in the cities of Gonaives and Trou du Nord.

Honduras
Providing food security for families:
ERD and the Diocese of Honduras are focused on urban and semi-urban populations.  All programs contain training, technical support and marketing components.  ERD is supporting such work in the 3 main cities of Honduras: bread-baking and masonry projects in the capital of Tegucigalpa, baking in San Pedro Sula, and tourism and other services in Tela.  ERD is also working on community gardens in rural areas around Copan.

Kenya
Food security through micro-credit loans:
ERD is partnering with the Ecumenical Church Loan Fund to support food security in local communities through micro-credit activities. Micro-credit loans will help people start their own businesses, envigorating the economy and allowing individuals to purchase their own food. In addition, once the loans are repaid, the money can be reloaned to other individuals in the same community.

Peru
Food security through micro-credit loans:
ERD is partnering with the Ecumenical Church Loan Fund to support food security in local communities through micro-credit activities. Micro-credit loans will help people start their own businesses, envigorating the economy and allowing individuals to purchase their own food. In addition, once the loans are repaid, the money can be reloaned to other individuals in the same community.

Philippines
Providing food security for communities:
In four villages, ERD’s food security program helps train people in livestock management, which helps to improve the quality of their crops.  This can raise personal income in each of the villages by up to 30%.  We are also partnering with six dioceses of the Episcopal Church in the Philippines to work on projects covering nine communities.  Projects include an irrigation system in Basao and Makilo which will allow farmers to pursue two croppings per year and allow them to farm new land that is currently dry.  Equipment such as mechanized mills, threshers, solar dryers and warehouses will help farmers become independent of business traders, and women and children will not have to manually pound their harvest -- freeing time for them to pursue other sources of income.  ERD is partnering with the Diocese of Central Philippines to work in three villages targeting onion marketing and merchandising, along with animal dispersal, improving farm technology, and gender equality.

ERD is partnering with the Ecumenical Church Loan Fund to support food security in local communities through micro-credit activities.  Micro-credit loans will help people start their own businesses, envigorating the economy and allowing individuals to purchase their own food.  In addition, once the loans are repaid, the money can be reloaned to other individuals in the same community.

South Africa
Providing food security for communities in South Africa:
ERD works with HOPE Africa, the social and economic development program for the Diocese of Cape Town.  A successful women’s quilting cooperative begun under the HOPE program has grown into a full-fledged business.  Many of the women employed through this project suffer from HIV/AIDS; their income means their children can remain in school and have a future.  Another income generating program assists HIV-positive women in Brown’s Farm Township.  The women work together to make beaded AIDS pins.  The work provides enough money for the women to care for their families and the business’s profits go into a fund to support children after they die.  To purchase a pin, click here.  ERD is scaling up their partnership with HOPE and the program will be implemented in three new dioceses in the Church of the Province of Southern Africa.

Tourism is a promising industry in South Africa.  ERD supported the building of the Bed and Breakfast Chalet and Conference center in Arniston, a picturesque yet impoverished seaside village.  The facility offers accommodations and meeting space for companies and groups and provides employment for the local community.  Community members have learned valuable skills and teamwork and are poised to expand their enterprise.  A similar project has been launched in Hawston, a beautiful seaside area, where a community-owned tourist resort is under construction.

ERD supported a successful computer-training program for young people from impoverished townships in Cape Town.  So far, more than 170 teens with limited education and no work history have learned the computer skills they need to get a job.

Sudan
Helping families secure food and earn an income:
At the Kakuma camp in northern Kenya, ERD is providing education and training for a class of students enrolled in vocational colleges in Kenya. The students are learning skills that will help them provide food and income for their families.

Tanzania
Helping families feed themselves:
ERD is teaching subsistence farmers alternative agricultural techniques and animal husbandry to increase food production.  An initial group of sixty farmers will be trained in improved farming methods, business skills, and commodity selling.  A total of six hundred families will benefit from increased crop production.   ERD also works with people on the island of Zanzibar by providing micro-loans and developing income generating projects in fish processing and marketing.  Vocational skill training will be provided.  ERD plans to form women and youth groups to establish farmer co-ops for cereal banks.  ERD will also support supplemental primary school nutrition.