ADES Santa Marta - Video Forums in El Ocotillo, Cabañas concluded

Published: May 29 2017

With more than 50 participants, ADES Santa Marta, together with leaders from El Ocotillo culminated the environmental training process, facilitating a series of video forums about mining, water, non-violent resistance, and defense of the territory.

Nelson Ventura, part of ADES’ technical team, said that the main purpose of video-forum technique has been to encourage community discussion and awareness about our rights and the importance of defending the environment and our territory.

Don Felipe Alberto López, a leader of the community, expressed how important these processes are for the community, “They are important to let people know everything that can be done to take care of the environment ... it is knowledge that we will pass down to our children.”

Ocotillo attended three video forums to learn about the impact of the mining projects, the fight against mining in Puya, Guatemala, and the importance of protecting the watershed.

Leadership organization and incidence

Throughout 23 years of community work, ADES Santa Marta has been accompanied by organizations, churches, national and international social groups, with whom, through cooperation and strategic partnerships, we have been able to carry out our community development initiatives.

The fields in which we have focused the most are education, community organizing and popular communication, solidarity economics, health, and organic agriculture.

Esther Ávalos Mesa

Invitation to the Utopia

I couldn’t avoid it. The famous words of Galeano were frolicking in my memory this Sunday as I attended the impressive Utopia Festival, brought to life by the Asociación de Desarrollo Económico y Social Santa Marta (ADES) and carried out by the youth from Cabañas and Cuscatlán. It took place in the Santa Marta Community Center.

Leadership, organization and incidence

Promote inclusive and horizontal leadership, with an emphasis on women and youth, that strengthen community organization. • Promote processes of political incidence, vindication of human rights and defense of the territories, in alliance with social movements.

Food sovereignty and agroecology

Promote the adoption of an agroecological model that contributes to the achievement of sustainable local agricultural systems that optimize and stabilize production, as the basis of food sovereignty.

Comprehensive water and sanitation management

Strengthen community participation in improving water and sanitation management, contributing to the exercise of the human right to water.