Skills Training Programs/Community Projects
FTF has built three training centers in remote areas of the Highlands, where classes are conducted. The FTF Guatemalan staff arranges with governmental agencies and local non-profit organizations to offer classes that help sponsored families learn skills to better support themselves. Tuition and materials costs are covered by the monthly donations of family sponsors. Due to the number of individually sponsored families being limited, FTF also manages projects that serve poverty-stricken communities of the Highlands. When sponsored families do not take up all the available class openings, non-sponsored families of the local area are encouraged to take part in these individual self-help and community programs.
Nutrition & Women's Programs
Courses have been offered to raise women's self-esteem and encourage them to take an active role in community affairs and decisions. These classes range from family health and nutrition to participation in entrepreneurial activities. FTF also helps fund some start-up ventures, such as stores or tailoring businesses.
Baking & Cooking
Courses in cooking and baking skills have helped improve the diets of hundreds of families. In addition, a bakery (with a large beehive oven) has been built in one of the villages, and some families are bake goods for sale.
Sewing, Weaving, & Embroidery
Courses have been offered to provide skills such as sewing, weaving, hand embroidery, and machine embroidery. While weaving and hand embroidery courses can be offered in remote communities, sewing courses are offered at a training center where sewing machines are available (donated by a firm in Spokane). The handcrafted products made by participants are high quality and may be sold by the individual who crafted the item or by Family-to-Family.
Gardening & Fruit Trees
Many families in the program learn to grow vegetable gardens. Some of the cooking and nutrition classes are offered in conjunction with gardening programs to demonstrate how to prepare foods and how vegetables (in addition to corn) help improve nutrition. Nearly 700 families have been trained in vegetable growing and organic gardening, and most families in the program begin to grow fruit trees.
Raising Livestock
People in the region have long depended upon agricultural products such as corn or chickens for their survival. Families in the program are learning improved ways of raising chickens, goats, sheep, cows, etc. They take coursework in the proper feeding and care for their animals, including the need for vaccinations. This helps improve their production of domestic animals. Over two hundred hundred families in FTF have had some form of livestock production training.
Coffee Production
Families participating in the coffee production project hike several hours from their homes at 10,000 + ft elevation to a more tropical coastal area where they stay and work for one week at a time. The harvested coffee beans must be picked, dried, and carried out over a mountain range to be taken to the city for roasting. The coffee beans are typically harvested twice per year.
Proceeds from the sales of this award-winning coffee are invested back into Family-to-Family program activities.
Reforestation
The FTF reforestation program began about 20 years ago and now includes over ten locations in the Highlands. The program provides employment and training for forest managers and the forests are now a source of firewood for local families and lumber for construction. In addition, the forests are making a positive environmental impact by retaining groundwater and generating springs in previously barren areas. The FTF reforestation program has been cited as a model program and has received considerable national and international recognition.
Education
FTF provides job-related training for individuals and communities, but FTF's mission does not include direct support for schools and educational programs. However, children living in poverty must often begin working in the corn fields or collecting firewood to sell at an early age, thus limiting educational opportunities. Support from sponsors and funds directed toward education help enable families to send their children to local schools.
Road Construction
Many communities we serve are very remote, with no road access. Road construction is not an ongoing activity of FTF; however, some roads and bridges have been constructed to provide access to very isolated communities. Much of the road work can be done by manual labor, but some rocks are even a challenge for tractors.
Trade Centers & Construction Projects
Training center under construction (left) and completed (right) in Ixtahuacan
With the help of grant and sponsor funding, FTF has constructed three training centers in the Highlands. The facility in Ixtahuacan (shown here), at the 7,500 ft level, includes a bakery with a large beehive oven. The training center in Nueva Ixtahuacan (also known as “Alaska” or “Chwi Petan”) was constructed in conjunction with a new health clinic and serves families at the 11,000 ft elevation level.