Food Aid Needed in Chiapas Town Hit by Storms

With percent of crops destroyed, the infrastructure compromised, and their insecticide stock depleted, a hundred farm families in Miguel Aleman, located on the Suchiate River and the Guatemalan border, are in crisis.

The village Miguel Aleman, in the Suchiate district of Chiapas, Mexico, has historically suffered frequent torrential rain and hurricanes. Recently, the townspeople had just recovered from Hurricane Stan in 2005 when Tropical Storm Barbara blew across Miguel Aleman in extreme Southern Mexico on June 2, 2007.

In response to the immediate, urgent needs of the people of Miguel Aleman, the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee (www.crwrc.org) is partnering with La Iglesia Nacional Presbiteriana de Mexico’s local El Jordan congregation at their request, and with Proteccion Civil, to help Miguel Aleman families who are stretched to their financial limits because of crop loss. Day workers and growers are especially at risk in the next three to nine months before younger, less affected plants begin to produce.

CRWRC will provide the most affected farm families in Miguel Aleman with $107,100 Pesos (US$9,963) of basic food aid in these urgent three months following Tropical Storm Barbara. Miguel Aleman beneficiary families include banana growers, day workers, those whose houses were damaged by Barbara, and poor women. Monthly food packages over the three month relief period will contain maize flour, black beans, rice, cooking oil, pasta, oats, fish, biscuits, and sugar.

In the next nine month CRWRC’s partners will continue to work with affected families in Miguel Aleman to help restore their income to pre-storm levels, after the most urgent needs for food and income are met, so that children can return to school, and day workers and village families are able to rebuild their basic income....

CRWRC has been active in Chiapas, Mexico, since 1969 through the Mexican Association of Rural and Urban Development (AMEXTRA) and the Reformed Presbyterian Church in Mexico-Chol. CRWRC currently provides consultation to these now independent partners through Moises Colop, CRWRC Country Consultant, who is based in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala and is a minister of the National Presbyterian Church there.

CRWRC is seeking donations to help meet the immediate, urgent needs of ninety farm families in Miguel Aleman. Designate your financial gift to CRWRC “Mexico Storm Relief” at CRWRC, 2850 Kalamazoo Ave. SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49560. Donations can be made by calling 1-800-55-CRWRC or online at www.crwrc.org.

For more information about these and other CRWRC programs, please visit www.crwrc.org or call 1-800-55-CRWRC. In Canada, please call 1-800-730-3490. CRWRC is a Christian, non-profit organization of the Christian Reformed Church in North America providing a ministry of development, relief, and justice education to people in need around the world. All donations are tax deductible.