Sustainable Garden Project
This project is a proof-of-concept sustainable garden in which we are developing ways to farm Tilapia in an aquaponic system. The aim is to reduce hunger by teaching the community to create its own sources of food, develop new sustainable farming methods, provide employment for families, and reinvest in the community via other JCH projects. We estimate that in the first year of this project we will be able to employ 2 families, train community members, produce 10,000 seedlings for sale, raise cassava and beans for consumption, and return $6,600 to reinvest into the community and other JCH projects.
We need a donation of $14,700 to maintain the workforce until the sale of seedlings begins
Macrame Project
This project makes use of the Francisco Lira Community Center. It is a co-op business, carried out by underprivileged individuals from the community seeking self-sustainability. So far we have taught macramé skills, created video lessons, taught business principles, and sourced materials. Products that are being created are keychains, plant hangers, wall panels, embroidered towels, necklaces, and bracelets. We estimate that this will provide about $655 of income for 10 families over the first year, and sustain itself after that without further investment.
We need to invest in the sales process for 6 months to maintain material levels and production, and seek out stores and establishments for sales. We need $7,560 to make this happen.
Harvest Project
Many families in Córrego da Volta live in an arrangement with landowners that resembles serfdom. They are allowed to live on the property in a Taipa house (stick and mud) to take care of the land and share a small part of what it produces. They typically are not allowed to build more permanent housing or expand the house. Their ability to profit from their own labor on the land is severely limited, making it very difficult or impossible to save toward buying their own plot. They also have nothing to leave their children after working the land over their lifetime. We don’t think that model is sustainable and it certainly doesn’t motivate or empower the people in the community to better themselves. There are also families that don’t even have access to land to plant anything for themselves and their families. Since most workers live off a combination of odd jobs, what they can grow themselves, and what nature provides, this severely limits their options to care for themselves and their families.
The Harvest Project is an investment in future sustainability for entire communities that are currently at risk. The Harvest Project will develop the agricultural technology to raise vanilla beans, increase Cashew production, and grow cassava, corn, and beans in order to provide jobs for families, give children another option besides slave labor, and invest in long-term growth through more productive farming methods and crops. By supporting the local economy, we hope to enable parents to feed their families, keep kids in school, and solve some of the problems that make these families at risk in the first place.
Clearing the land will cost about $34,140 to prepare it for planting. Help these families have a place to plant and harvest!
Thrift Store Project
The Thrift Shop provides affordable clothing options for the community, whose nearest town is 40 minutes away and largest city is 3 hours away. Stock is maintained through clothing donations from local and international stores. This provides a way for JCH to provide retail sales training and entrepreneurship training.
We need a donation of $9,600 to keep the store open and continue the work of sourcing Brazilian donations of additional clothes and build local business partnerships.
JCH Sports INitiatives
Sports have proven to be one of the best ways to keep kids out of gangs in Northeastern Brazil. Currently only 12% of children in Northeastern Brazil have access to any kind of sports programs, so JCH supports several sports initiatives, from hosting organized sports in our own Community Center to sponsorship of local teams and players. We target the ages of 6 to 14 so kids can have a solid support system and sense of purpose before entering the age most recruited into gangs and a life of violence: 15 years old.
In order to maintain sponsorship of existing projects, expand our facility with additional basketball hoops and sand volleyball court, and continue to invest in our sports structures as a free way for the community to access sports, we need $17,200.
The Race for Water: Córrego da Volta Well Project
Many poor people in the world do not have access to clean water and need to find ways to survive, or risk serious consequences to life and health. Some regions in the community of Córrego da Volta also experience this lack of water. Those with better conditions manage to have piped water, but the poorest need to walk kilometers to have access to water that is often not drinkable. During the rainy season, which lasts about 3 months, these families collect water through improvised gutters on the roofs, trying to store the water in barrels or cisterns to drink during the drought. But their stores are often not enough, and some families are forced to use water from contaminated sources when they run out. In the drought season, municipal water is often turned off in outlying neighborhoods, further straining local sources. This creates health problems which impacts their work and their ability to plant crops, which consequently increases hunger. We have the ability to dig a well to supply the mini community center with its own water. There is a source of clean water at about 100 feet of depth. This well will enable us to save money, provide water to our future hydroponic garden, and also provide a fountain where anyone in the community can get water free of charge when the city shuts off their water supply during drought. Our plan is to drill the well and install a solar powered pump to furnish water to a public water station, as well as pipe it into storage tanks for the community garden and hydroponics. Our well will have the objective of minimizing hardship in the community and meeting the demands of our Community Center projects. Find out more about our projects. Help us to bring water and reduce the hunger of those who suffer without water for 9 months out of the year, and develop diseases that lead to malnourishment and death.
The cost of the well, pump, pipe, and fountain will be $17,000. Help us provide water to this community.