To see the video clips of these songs, click on the links below:
Stop a la violencia de género (Stop Violence against Women)
Tú y yo (You and Me)
Gender based violence is far too common in El Salvador, Central America’s smallest country with a population of a little over six million. Domestic violence, sexual harassment, psychological abuse, and rape are widespread, while femicide—the murder of women—has reached epidemic levels. With 347 and 348 femicides in 2007 and 2008 respectively, the rates are among the highest in Central America.
Oxfam America, together with eight other development and women’s rights organizations, is working to reduce the levels of gender based violence, and create changes in behavior, practices and beliefs in El Salvador, a country with deeply rooted ‘machista’ culture.
For the last five years, the campaign has worked on training women in rural areas, professionals and female legislators. However, the most innovative strategy of the campaign is the work with youth; every country’s future.
A new, innovative approach is the EDUCO-BUS, which travels to public schools, and uses music and theater to engage students. The bus’ activities, such as interactive theatre, cooperative games and choreography, provoke critical thinking on gender roles and violence, demonstrate that every individual has the power to change the course of gender violence and talk about what can be done to stop it. Over 40,000 students have participated in the EDUCO-BUS program.
]]>We have been hearing a lot about the mangroves on this trip to the Pacific coast where countless families are struggling against a poverty that forces them to live where no one else will: in low-lying areas prone to flooding and along the sides of dirt roads that become hard to negotiate during heavy rains.
South of here, in a town called Metalío, we have just met with Francisco Calzadilla, a member of the technical team for Caritas, which, together with Oxfam America and three other donor groups, as well as six local non-governmental organizations, has joined a consortium called PRVAS—or Programa Reducción de Vulnerabilidades Ahuachapán-Sonsonate. One of its goals is to help communities carry out mitigation projects to reduce their risk in disasters. And that's where the mangroves come in.
"They serve as a natural barrier—to the waves and the wind off the ocean," says Calzadilla. "They also provide a food source. They serve as an ecosystem for shellfish."
The strip of mangroves Calzadilla is particularly concerned with, stretches for about 20 kilometers around Metalío. He estimates that about 50 percent of that stretch has been deforested as people cut down the trees for both construction material and firewood.
But in August, with support from PRVAS, community members took steps to recover some of those losses, said Calzadilla. They collected, sorted, and planted 20,000 mangrove seeds—they look like long, slender pods—along a two-kilometer deforested strip.
It will be a while—10 years predicted Calzadilla—before the seedlings mature enough to serve as a barrier against the onslaught of Mother Nature. In areas where the mangroves have disappeared and there is nothing to break the force of winds, small houses have blown away, Calzadilla said.
In some neighborhoods around Acajutla, El Salvador's largest port, mangrove forests have been severely reduced—replaced by fill and the simple homes of some of the country's poorest residents.
Further east in the department of Usulután, preservation efforts are underway for some of the mangrove forests in Jiquilisco Bay, where Oxfam America is helping local fishermen organize themselves to improve their production and protect their livelihoods. They depend on the resources that flourish in the dense tangle of roots, mud, and tidal water.
Deep in the pre-dawn gloom of one protected area in the bay, we can just make out a platform where watchmen keep round-the-clock guard over this watery haven supported by funds from the United Nations. Here, mollusks can get a solid start and help to increase the catch that local fishermen need to feed their families.
Later, after the sun is up and the tide has receded, the mangrove forests in Jiquilisco Bay come alive with the chirping and scrambling of wildlife. Herons pick their way over the mud flats. A raccoon darts through the exposed roots. A vulture studies us from his perch on a branch.
Juan Larín Rojas, a 54-year-old fisherman, eyes each one of them with delight. He knows many of their scientific names. This is his turf, and despite the challenges of making a living from these mangroves and the sea around them, he wouldn't give up this life for anything.
"I love fishing. I love the sea. I love feeling free," he says.
]]>The house is gone now, and Canjura, her husband, and their four boys have moved to a new cinder block house—with a tile floor and a composting latrine—built by an aid group a short distance away. But for many poor people settled in this mangrove swamp, all the problems remain of living on marginal land, made more hazardous by the increased flooding climate change seems to be triggering.
And that's why Canjura, with the help of Oxfam America and a consortium of aid groups, is now rallying with other local activists to bring their problems to the attention of the Salvadoran government and push for help.
The consortium, made up of five donor groups and six local non-governmental organizations, started two years ago with a program called PRVAS—or Programa Reducción de Vulnerabilidades Ahuachapán-Sonsonate. The program helps communities in the area organize themselves to better prepare for disasters, carry out small mitigation projects, and win the ear of local governments. The idea behind the PRVAS is to help people help themselves—and find ways to make a new civil protection law, passed in 2005, work for them.
"If we just continue from an emergency response perspective, all we'll do year after year is help rescue people," says Henry Giovani Magaña the coordinator for PRVAS. "We won't help people overcome their vulnerabilities—which is what we want."
We are sitting in a small community center, a low-slung ocean-front structure on loan to residents in this coastal region from a Salvadoran living in the US. Other buildings—some less substantial than this one—line both sides of the street. And further back, amid pools of murky water, stretch what's left of the mangroves in this area. The construction of a railroad down to the coast in the 1930s marked the beginning of their end.
Magaña explains that when the railroad came, landless families, in search of jobs and a place to live, settled here, and slowly the swampland began to get developed. Nearby, the Sensunapan River, now reportedly one of the most polluted in this tiny country, drains into the sea, its water silted and brown. The river serves as both a source of income—shirtless diggers scoop boatloads of sand from its floor—and dread: During heavy rains, the Sensunapan spills from its channel and floods the surrounding homes.
Though fill and levees have altered the landscape in these coastal neighborhoods, the basic topography has not changed—with consequences that have proved dire in the decades since for poor people clinging to this strip of land along the Pacific.
"Nature doesn't make mistakes," says Magaña. "It wants this to be wet. There are floods here all the time."
And now, compounding the trouble, are changing weather patterns that are making life even more challenging for the families struggling here.
"About five years ago we started to notice that the sea is coming in further, and when there are very high tides it's slowly eroding houses along the shore," says Hilton Alcir Aguilar, a volunteer coordinator for the five coastal neighborhoods participating in the PRVAS program in Acajutla. "And the rains are heavier. Before, it would take two hours of rain for water to rise high enough to flood. Now, it happens in one hour."
Canjura has spent all of her 30 years right here in the La Playa neighborhood. And in that time she has begun to see changes that are having serious implications for her family.
"When we have these temporales—the storms that rain for several days—the water rises. But with climate change, we're seeing more flooding and we're also seeing it in areas that didn't flood before," she says. "Here most of the men are fishermen and they used to be able to haul in a lot but because of climate change, the fish seemed to have migrated away from here. It's really affected their ability to support their families. Some are looking for work as bricklayers. Some have opened bike repair shops. And some continue to fish."
Her husband is one of those—a fisherman.
"It has affected us," says Canjura. "He's getting less fish. If we used to eat two tortillas at a meal, now we're eating one." Sometimes, she says, her children go hungry.
"When you talk to people about climate change here, they're much more concerned," said Magaña. "They know storms are going to get worse, and if they're already living in vulnerable positions, it will make them more vulnerable."
What are the answers?
One solution, says Canjura, is the construction of a levee system on the Sensunapan River that would protect the densely populated community along one of its banks. But the price tag is steep, and no one has agreed to fund it, she adds. Nevertheless, other smaller projects proposed by locals and supported by PRVAS members are now moving ahead.
"We're trying to organize community councils so we can put together project proposals and seek support," says Canjura. She points to the recent construction of a seawall in La Playa as proof of what's possible when enough people get behind an idea. Designed to keep high tides from slopping onto the coastal road and into the homes of people along it, the seawall was built with help from Caritas, the mayor's office, and plenty of manual labor provided by the community.
"All of us felt very proud," says Canjura. "We were very happy we were able to achieve that."
Other projects in the works include the paving of a dirt evacuation route in the community of El Milagro. All it takes is two hours of heavy rain before the neighborhood floods with water up to people's knees, says José Vidal Aguillón, chairman of a local community council. A paved evacuation route will allow them to get out fast—without vehicles getting stuck in the mud. A broad drainage ditch, also under construction, will help the floodwaters to drain away more quickly—and prevent possible contaminants in the water from lingering.
But construction projects aren't all that's needed to help poor people in coastal Acajutla weather the increasing challenges they face. They need a voice and they need influence—both of which PRVAS is slowly helping them muster.
"From the training in disaster risk reduction we've gone through with the PRVAS program, we've built our skills to advocate for greater aid from the government—and we're also getting more involved in working with the government," says Aguilar, the community coordinator. "The biggest achievement is the unity in the five communities—that we're united behind the same goal—and the influence we're starting to have in different government institutions."
With that influence, perhaps the communities will be able to lobby successfully for more opportunities for advanced schooling or vocational training in Acajutla—both critical if people are to become competitive in the job market. With fishing drying up, many of the Acajutla's breadwinners are going to have to find other means of making a living.
Canjura seems to be keenly aware of that. She has only a sixth-grade education, and her husband stopped his schooling after the third grade. But all four of their children are steadily moving up through the grades, even as finding the resources to buy the necessary school supplies is a constant worry for Canjura and her husband. Their oldest son will soon be entering eighth grade.
Would she like to see them go on to high school?
Canjura sighs deeply at the question, and is silent for a moment.
"That's my goal," she says finally. "I really want them to get ahead. But the way things are now, it's pretty hard."
]]>El Salvador is a densely populated nation, with over 300 people living in each square kilometer (with roughly 800 people living in each square mile). It is also a country where 96 percent of the surface water is contaminated, and where only 3 percent of the original forest cover still stands. It is for these reasons that Oxfam, the Catholic Church, the Roundtable on Metals Mining, and other sectors of society believe that mining projects are inappropriate for the country under current conditions. With this telephone call to the radio station, the President agreed. His strong and firm position could have far reaching implications for the efforts of various civil society organizations to reform the current Mining Law.
The arrival of mining companies to El Salvador in recent years has provoked tensions and conflicts between affected communities and other sectors of society. Under the rules of the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), Canadian mining company Pacific Rim began an arbitration process last December against El Salvador for refusing to grant the company a mining production license. Saca says he would prefer to confront the company and be forced to pay it the US $77 million it says it has invested in the country rather than negotiate with the company and grant the license.
Oxfam America, which has raised concerns about mining activity in El Salvador, its impacts on communities, and its role in the development process, supports Saca's position.
"It's an important step for El Salvador to be the first Latin American country that undertakes a critical analysis of the costs and benefits of these mining projects and exercises its right to say 'no' to mining within its borders," says Andrés McKinley, a program officer for extractive industries with Oxfam's office in Central America. Oxfam America has an international campaign which maintains that both communities and governments have the right to know the full extent of the potential impacts of mining projects and the right to freely decide whether or not they want these projects in the country. (Right to Know, Right to Decide Campaign).
In its desire to turn the words of the highest government authority into a firm commitment, the National Roundtable On Metals Mining presented a memorandum in the legislature on March 3. This correspondence asks the legislators to vote in favor of a bill that prohibits metals mining in El Salvador. The bill was originally presented by the Roundtable in December 2006.
"The position of the president is an excellent one, albeit belated," says Francisco Pineda of the National Roundtable on Metals Mining."After four years in government he proved us—the communities, the church and the studies—correct: mining is bad. That's why we are presenting this memorandum, so that the President's message can become a political position," he said. "This issue was second on the agenda, which means it is considered important. Legislators of different parties and factions that wouldn't meet with us in the past are now doing so. We listened to the speech given by an ARENA legislator and he took the same position as the President. We hope this is not merely because we are in a campaign season, but that they continue to take this position for the good of the Salvadoran people."
Since 2005, Oxfam America has been working on the issue of mining in Central America. Through its studies, such as the recently published report, "Metals Mining and Sustainable Development in Central America: An assessment of Benefits and Costs"; its participation in forums; its dialogue with NGOs and government agencies; and media interviews, Oxfam has promoted public debate on mining. We provide information on mining and its impacts, and provide advocacy training to coalitions of organizations concerned about the possible impacts of this industry. In addition, we help coalitions engage in productive dialogue with the government, to develop concrete proposals, and use non-violent strategies.
]]>That was 15 years ago. Today, clean water in the small communities of El Recuerdo and Agua Zarca is as precious as ever—and still hard to get. There's no turning on the tap over a kitchen sink and letting the gallons gush. Here, many people trudge to a communal source, fill their jugs, and lug the heavy load home again. But seasonal flooding—sometimes hugely destructive and, with climate change, possibly becoming more severe—contaminates many of the area's hand-dug wells, exposing people to waterborne illnesses.
But now, with the help of Oxfam America and its local partner, PROVIDA, the well that Cruz worked so hard to dig on the school grounds in El Recuerdo is pumping enough clean water to satisfy the drinking needs not only of the students but of about 80 families in the surrounding area. The well is one of five "healthy wells" in southern Zacatecoluca province PROVIDA lined, surrounded with a filter, capped to ensure its cleanliness, and outfitted with a pump that sends water to a large tank for chlorination and storage.
"The families in this area are living in extreme poverty, living as subsistence farmers or low paid day laborers in the nearby sugar cane plantations," says Karina Copen, an Oxfam humanitarian program officer. "They face numerous challenges in having to adapt to the increased frequency and intensity of the flooding in their area. With access to a healthy well, they can at least know that in the next flood, they will have a safe source of water for their families and the good health that comes along with it."
Adaptations, such as these healthy wells, are essential for Salvadoran families living in the department of La Paz in the lower region of the Lempa River where seasonal rains, tropical depressions, and hurricanes, make it one of the country's most flood-prone areas.
Coupled with those natural hazards is the fact that communities in the region have significantly less access to improved water sources and sanitation than other parts of the country. The "healthy wells" along with 27 new composting latrines have been a boon to families in the area.
"Kids are getting sick less; families are healthier," says Santos Efrain Coto, one of the local leaders in El Recuerdo. "When they drank contaminated water they got diarrhea and parasites."
The improved wells are based on a model that's new to El Salvador and designed by an organization called Swiss Labour Assistance. Besides having their tops sealed with cement to prevent polluted flood waters from slopping in, the wells are lined with a type of plastic pipe, known as polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, that extends down into the aquifer. Packed around the outside of the lining is a filter of volcanic rock that prevents contamination from seeping through underground.
At the El Recuerdo school one day recently, teacher Ana Elsa Cubias describes how students used to bring their own water from home to drink during the school day. Now, the refurbished well guarantees them a clean supply right on the spot.
"They're drinking water from a protected source and the kids have water right in the classroom," says Cubias.
A short distance from the classrooms sits a large plastic tank, sky blue and able to hold 1,100 liters of water pumped fresh from the well. Chlorinated, the water from the tank flows to two taps standing just outside the gates to the school. They're accessible to whoever is driving or walking by. And to ensure the stored water stays safe for drinking, the water committee arranges to have the tank cleaned every couple of weeks—a task that falls to a child small enough to wiggle inside and scrub the interior walls with a brush and bleach.
"We make sure he bathes before he gets in the tank," adds Coto, the local leader.
In Agua Zarca, a few communities over, Jose Luis Funes Cruze says that before PROVIDA and Oxfam installed the new well, most of the local residents depended on their own backyard wells for drinking water—and that was a problem.
"The household wells take on a lot of rain water and a lot of filthy water when there's flooding," says Cruz, pointing in the direction of the polluted San Antonio River, which spills its banks during big storms. "The things people throw in—there are pigs up river. And the cheese factory is up river."
In the past, when their drinking supply has been contaminated, families in Agua Zarca have had to rely on the government or aid groups to truck in drinking water for them.
But now, with a new communal well their supply of drinking water is much improved.
"We're very grateful—the whole community is—to have that water," says Blanca Lidia Jiménez, who lives close to the well makes about six trips a day to fetch enough water for the seven people in her house. "We don't get sick so much when we drink the water from this well. The little kids would get swollen bellies, but with the new well that problem has been solved."
Still, the situation in Agua Zarca points to the challenges of providing clean water in this area. The community's new well was built on the only land available: next to a cow pasture—an arrangement that could be problematic during the wet season when rain sloshes manure about and allows it to seep into the groundwater.
The deep plastic lining on the well and its volcanic-rock filter help, though, says Guillermo Morán, a professor and researcher at the University of El Salvador's Earth Sciences Institute. He worked with Oxfam America and another of its partners, the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI), to evaluate the effectiveness of the wells while studying the health practices of families who use them.
The study is an important component of Oxfam's public health work: It promotes accountability and offers a different model for aid groups by linking their work with that of universities.
"We have the field experience and they have the technical expertise," says Miriam Aschkenasy, Oxfam America's public health specialist. "Together we're able to evaluate programs at a higher standard and at one that increases accountability."
In its draft report, HHI said that individuals who live in communities with "healthy wells" were less likely to have diarrhea and reported fewer cases of the illness during the time of the study. But the draft report also revealed that in two of those communities, some people were still using hand-dug wells for their drinking water while other people from places without "healthy wells" were making the trek to a community that had one to fetch their water.
"The study gives us insight in a way we couldn't have anticipated," says Aschkenasy. "It gives us an idea of where to focus in the future. We now know we need to find a way to encourage people who are still relying on the hand-dug wells to use the healthy ones instead. And it gives us great incentive to build more of them."
]]>The report, Metals Mining and Sustainable Development in Central America: An Assessment of Benefits and Costs, looks at the current debate surrounding mining in Central America and the need for informed public discussion over the potential costs and benefits of aggressive development. Launched yesterday at a regional forum on metals mining, the report focuses on mining projects in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.
"Metals mining is often associated with vast wealth," said Raymond C. Offenheiser, President of Oxfam America. "Unfortunately, this is not the reality in many developing countries where natural resources continuously fail to contribute to the long-term reduction of poverty and communities have little say in how the industry affects their lands and livelihoods."
Despite a long history in Central America, mining has never played a significant role in the economies of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Even if all the resources of these nations were developed, revenue from minerals would amount to only a small fraction of their broadly diversified economies.
But high gold and minerals prices in recent years have renewed mining companies' interest in Central American metals. The Oxfam report pays special attention to Pacific Rim Mining Corporation's El Dorado Mine in El Salvador, Goldcorp Inc.'s Marlin Mine in Guatemala, and Goldcorp's San Martin Mine in Honduras.
While mining companies and the governments that support new mining proposals have emphasized the benefits of mining, organized sectors of civil society are more concerned with the long-term costs. And there is a growing awareness of the decision-making role of communities near these projects.
"Mining companies must respect local communities' right to free, prior, and informed consent," said Offenheiser. "If they do not, a mining' project's costs will likely outweigh its benefits for local people."
While mining may create great net value, most of that value flows out of the country to the foreign owners of the mining company. Minerals commodity markets are highly volatile, modern open-air pit mining creates relatively few jobs, and the life cycles of open-pit mines are short, offering a small window of opportunity for integration with local economies.
Environmental risks include acid mine drainage and dam leaks. Although some of the worst environmental outcomes are preventable, mining companies have often not been held accountable for obeying environmental rules set out by the government or their mining contracts.
To date, community protests have delayed mining activities in Guatemala, prompted public scrutiny of exploration activities in El Salvador, and generated legislative reform in Honduras. The level and intensity of the resistance to metal mining in these three Central American nations demonstrates that local communities have judged the costs of mining projects to exceed the local benefits.
"Communities closest to the mines almost invariably suffer. This can be prevented if they have a voice in the decisions for the project," said Keith Slack, Extractive Industries Program Manager at Oxfam America. "What the mining industry could contribute to these communities must be balanced with the full scope of its costs, and communities are bringing legitimate concerns about financial, environmental, and personal costs to the table."
]]>Thanks to a US Agency for International Development (USAID) agricultural diversification program, the melons have brought unprecedented prosperity to Cortez and other farmers in rural Parras Lempa, El Salvador. USAID's program helps farmers improve their growing techniques, cultivate new crops, and earn higher incomes.
While the present is a time of great success, it's the future that Cortez is thinking of: his two teenage sons, who attend high school during the day and then help him in the fields. "This is the example I try to set for them: to keep learning and to work hard," he says. "That's their heritage."
This hard work is paying off. Cortez leads a group of 64 local farmers who take part in the program; in the past two years, they've collectively invested $90,000 in renting additional fertile land. Cortez's group now manages 40 percent more land—a total of 252 acres—generating an additional $184,000 in annual income and 306 new jobs for the community.
The origins of this particular USAID program go back to early 2001, when two strong earthquakes struck central El Salvador and smashed a series of rural farming towns. USAID's country office quickly assessed the needs of these communities and began a $200 million multiyear project to rebuild damaged houses, roads, and schools.
Through those assessments, the USAID team saw that it wasn't enough to use the agriculture component of the project just to bring communities back to where they were before the earthquake; people would still be struggling to earn a living from subsistence crops. USAID would need to create new long-term solutions in order to bring about true economic development.
USAID found that new growing techniques could help the farmers of central El Salvador improve their productivity. The agency selected Fintrac, a US-based private contractor specializing in agriculture, to implement a four-year program. Fintrac built on local knowledge by hiring top Salvadoran agronomists to work closely with the farmers on the new methods.
"Other agronomists that have come with previous projects barely spent any time with you," says Cortez. "What's been different about these agronomists [from Fintrac] is that they are here with us every week, and they really get involved in teaching us every single trick of the production techniques."
In communities like Parras Lempa, farmers learned new techniques—different seed varieties, more efficient fertilizing methods, new planting patterns—to improve upon the crops their families had been growing for generations.
In other communities, like nearby Calderitas, farmers learned how to cultivate tomatoes and peppers, which fetch high prices on the domestic market. A drip irrigation system made it possible to grow the vegetables using less water and without the time-consuming labor of hand-watering.
Along the way, Fintrac had to adapt the program to the reality on the ground. Fintrac's agronomists learned that their approach didn't work well with farmers who had less than an acre of land, limited access to credit, or insufficient access to water or roads. But the farmers who met these criteria thrived under Fintrac's assistance.
Fintrac's successes led USAID to rehire the company for an additional four-year program cycle. Today many of these rural entrepreneurs—like the group in Parras Lempa—earn enough to invest their own resources, with the goal of eventually becoming independent from the program.
Fintrac succeeded at promoting economic development by doing the following:
As the second four-year cycle nears its end, USAID must now tackle the challenge of making its lessons live beyond the program's end date and boundaries. The agency is currently transferring Fintrac's knowledge to agronomists in the Ministry of Agriculture. USAID is also building partnerships with local nongovernmental organizations that will allow it to reach smaller-scale farmers—including those who originally weren't able to take part in the program.
And in a domestic market increasingly dominated by supermarket chains, USAID will need to invest in new partnerships that enable organized farmers to retain their selling power.
"In spite of the earmarks and political concerns that often keep aid programs from achieving their full potential, this example shows that USAID can implement meaningful, transformative programs," says Omar Ortez, Oxfam America's senior coordinator for programming and partnership, who visited the program in spring 2008.
"This program came about because of an emergency, but made an early commitment to long-term development. By hiring the best Salvadoran agronomists, USAID built on local knowledge and became context-driven. It learned hard lessons about its approach and adapted the program accordingly. If the US funded more long-term aid programs like this one, just imagine what could be accomplished in the fight against rural poverty."
Learn more about Oxfam America's Aid Reform initiative.
]]>"He insulted us and beat me up," she says, tears welling up with the memory. Ortiz recounts the ordeal in her dirt-floor house in the department of Ahuachapan, sitting on a simple wood chair, holding her four-year-old daughter Melissa—her youngest. "One of my children said to me, 'Mama, let's get out of here,' so we went outside."
That spring night, outside their blue concrete house, the threats continued. "He insulted me so much... saying I was worthless, I had no future, and that it was better for him to kill me and the children."
Ortiz had to take action because her husband was a police officer and had a firearm. The family took shelter at a neighbor's house, and Ortiz called the police. Her husband was arrested the next morning. She and her children were safe for the moment, but in his drunken rage he had burned all their clothes.
The hills in Ahuachapan are bright green after a rainy summer. Blue and yellow butterflies fly lazily among the coffee trees along the dirt roads, and the sun is warm and comforting. It looks peaceful, making the violent confrontation Ortiz describes seem out of place. But in this small country of six million, widespread violence tends to be particularly deadly for women.
El Salvador is still recovering from a 13-year civil war that saw 75,000 people killed and nearly 8,000 "disappeared." It is a politically polarized society, torn between a small business elite, which dominates commerce and the government, and the majority struggling in poverty. Socially, men are dominant: It is a machista culture that holds many women in submissive roles in the family, raising children and doing other work in the home. Roughly half of Salvadorans live in poverty, and women head about 25 percent of households, so the abuse of and discrimination against women contributes directly to keeping them poor and in their subservient role in society.
There is a paucity of data on violence against women in El Salvador, but what few details are available tell a brutal story: In a country about the geographic size of Massachusetts, the rate of "femicide" in El Salvador was 11.15 per 100,000 women in 2005, far exceeding Guatemala's rate (population nearly 13 million) of 7.96 for that same year, according to a 2006 report by the Inter-American Institute of Human Rights. The same report shows the numbers of women murdered in El Salvador inching up slowly from 2001, when there were 211 women killed, to 260 in 2004, before jumping to 390 in 2005. The 2006 total was 437, according to Yanira Argueta, director of the Association of Salvadoran Women. "The situation is critical," she says at a meeting in her office in San Salvador. "Public officials are not sensitive to the problem, and there is no good application of the laws."
Part of the problem is public perception. A 2006 poll by CS Sondeo found that only about 83 percent of people in El Salvador believe that rape is a crime—which means that more than 15 percent don't consider it a criminal act.
Whether rape, murder, assault, or even psychological abuse, violence against women is more than an injustice or a human rights violation: it is an investment in the social status quo that keeps men on top and women below them. And it prevents women from fully contributing to the two changes El Salvador desperately needs: an end to poverty and the building of democracy.
]]>Molina de Vasquez worked hard to get the group established because she wants women to have opportunities to work outside their homes so they can broaden their horizons. "So many women are mistreated by their husbands," she says. "They need to know about their rights and feel capable of doing things."
"I would like to get women to know about their rights and duties, and to increase their self-esteem. We can help ourselves and our families, care for our children, and earn income to change our lives."
When asked why helping other women is so important to her, she says, "Let me tell you a little about my own life; then you will know."
The details come spilling out; she's like someone who walks away from a serious car accident, describing how lucky she is just to be alive. Mistreated by her father, her mother abused, Molina de Vasquez was married at 14 to a soldier. "I thought it was a way to escape," she says, "but my life got worse." Her husband was violent, and his family "used to tell me that my job was to have children and take care of my husband." When she failed to deliver a child for the first three years of their marriage, "I was useless to them," Molina de Vasquez says with a sigh.
But others could see that she was a leader. When their first child went to kindergarten, she was chosen to be the president of the parents' board at the school. "When I told my husband, he was angry. He told me I was not capable of it. I accepted this; he always told me I was good for nothing. For 11 years it was like that."
Eventually they moved to a rural area and things started to improve. Her husband became an agricultural laborer. They had a son. But Molina de Vasquez wanted to do more activities outside their home, like joining a health training program. Although reluctant to allow her to participate, her husband said she could host training sessions at their home. As part of this training, one of Oxfam's partners, AGROSAL, taught the women about their rights and how to prevent domestic violence. It was part of the Vida Diferente campaign to prevent gender violence.
"I started to listen to talks about preventing violence in the home," Molina de Vasquez says. "I learned about my rights." Since her husband allowed her to hold the meetings at their house, Molina de Vasquez took a risk: "I invited him to the talks and training sessions, and he became more sensitive." Together, she and her husband questioned the gender roles and attitudes in the machista culture in El Salvador, and they recreated their relationship. "Now my husband and I solve problems through dialogue, not violence," Molina de Vasquez says. He now recognizes how important it is for her to use her leadership skills. "If someone asks me to do something, I will do it because I know my husband will not say no."
Molina de Vasquez is committed to the new women's organization: "First I would like to get women to know about their rights and duties, and to increase their self-esteem." She says there are practical reasons for this, which leads to the second goal: "We need jobs for all the women. We can help ourselves and our families, care for our children, and earn income to change our lives." For Molina de Vasquez, respect for women and fighting poverty are part of the same struggle.
The changes in Molina de Vasquez's family are hard to compare to the earlier, oppressive days. "I have overcome it—so why can't I help other women? That is my goal: to help many other women."
]]>One of the goals of the campaign is to increase the number of women who understand their rights and can effectively defend them as Adelina Ortiz did. To help educate the next generation, the campaign developed a program for teachers and schoolchildren in 2007 that teaches young people about how to prevent gender violence and what to do if they are attacked.
"We used to talk about gender equity here," says Patricia Jovel. "But never gender violence." Jovel is the director of a school participating in this new initiative in El Progreso, a village perched on the impossibly steep Quetzaltepeque volcano outside San Salvador. The school, where 850 students from 6 to 16 years old attend classes in two half-day groups, is a collection of six cinderblock classrooms topped by metal sheet roofing on either side of a terraced concrete courtyard sloping down the mountainside. It is a beehive of activity after classes, as without any level area for a playground, the students play tag around the central courtyard in the brisk mountain air. Jovel says the young women who sometimes have to walk home in the dark after school are now better equipped to fend off the young men offering drinks and cigarettes to them. "Thank God there have been no rapes," she says.
The students have learned their lessons well: Karla Sanchez, 15, says it is a matter of her basic rights. "Everyone must respect our rights as children, girls, youth. We all have the same rights, and no one can violate them. And if something should happen, we know we can tell our parents, our teachers, or adults we trust. They are here to help us," she explains patiently. And if these people can't help, she knows where to go. She lists a number of institutions where she can turn for protection: the Human Rights Office; the National Police; and the Salvadoran Institute for the Advancement of Women, known as ISDEMU. As she leaves, Sanchez articulates one essential idea about reporting gender violence: "We should not be afraid of what people say."
In 2007, this pilot project in 53 schools exposed 25,000 students to the key messages of the campaign and trained 1,000 students and 1,000 teachers. The teachers now have incorporated violence prevention into their curriculum, and they work with the trained students. The pilot was supported by the Ministry of Education and was such a success that the minister decided to incorporate it into the public school curriculum nationwide.
Sustained pressure to change societal attitudes toward women is a slow process. One effective way to question long-held ideas and beliefs is to educate those entrusted with defending the rights of women, protecting them in the community, and helping them if they are attacked or injured. These include public officials like police officers, judges, public health officials and doctors, and social workers. The campaign organized a formal training program at the University of Central America (UCA) in 2005, and 45 people attended.
Maritza de Vasquez, a psychologist at the family court in the city of San Marcos, just outside San Salvador, says this training has helped her assist the many women who come through her office. De Vasquez says that women are hearing the messages of the campaign and are taking action to protect themselves. In the steady stream of domestic violence and divorce cases she sees, there is a different attitude. "Women take the opportunity to come here and talk about their situation they come here right away to denounce it," she says. "They are expressing their rights more openly now."
Back in Ahuachapan, Ortiz grows corn and raises sheep to support her children and grandchildren. He husband is in jail awaiting a hearing. "I'd rather see him in prison than anywhere else," Ortiz says. It was her participation in a sheep-raising program run by one of Oxfam America's partners, Association of Salvadoran Agriculturalists (AGROSAL), that exposed Ortiz to the human rights training that helped her defend her own life and protect her children. She points out that in all her training to become a health worker, no one ever educated her about domestic violence or how to prevent it. "The training taught me that women have rights and people are obligated to respect them," Ortiz says. "This made me act, to look for help, and thank God I found it."
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