Great recovery story from Peru

CARE-trained entrepreneurs make tents for hundreds of families
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/fromthefield/241510/118799662141.htm

(snips)
LIMA, Peru (Aug. 24, 2007) - The global poverty-fighting organization CARE has called on the talents of two Lima-based women entrepreneurs to produce hundreds of tents for earthquake survivors in need of shelter. As an estimated 40,000 families have lost their homes, and most continue to live in the open streets and fields under tarps and teepee-like structures, Maria Esther Landa and her sister Elvira Landa have gotten to work welding together heavy steel tent frames and stitching together durable covers. Each tent is designed for a family of six.
As in-country tent supplies have dried up, CARE looked for options to fill this need while also contributing to the local economy. The making of these tents in Lima comes at a critical time for quake survivors.

"I think a lot about people who were affected by the earthquake," says Maria. "I don't have a lot of resources, but by making these tents we can provide some comfort to people in their time of need. We can make big things happen with a lot of little things."

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This is a great story; congratulations, best wishes and blessings to these ladies and their company who are setting such a great example and helping their people with tangible skills.

This is an example of what I was blogging about a few months ago when I suggested that every young person learn a craft skill in addition to their academics, by the way. New Orleans would be a different place if large parts of the population knew how to drive a back hoe, carpentry, masonry, pollution control and other building/craft skills. Previous generations have all known you can't rely on the government and the political and corporate mandarins.