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The Jungle Mamas team has been hard at work these past few months and making excellent progress with addressing basic health needs in Achuar communities. In September, they successfully completed a Safe Births and Family Health workshop with two midwife facilitators, Yeshi Neumann and Naolí Vinaver. This workshop symbolized a milestone and a major turning point for the Jungle Mamas program. Only one month before, the Achuar Federation, NAE, gave Jungle Mamas permission to address family planning in the workshop – a delicate topic in the Achuar culture.
The Safe Births and Family Health workshop in the community of Pumpuentsa opened the door for further training and education in family planning, one step closer to community empowerment and improving the well-being of the Achuar people.
The goal of the workshop is to train men and women in the prevention, recognition, and treatment of local health problems in addition to providing theoretical and practical knowledge to attend community births. Thanks to a continuous education, the communities of Pumpuentsa, Kurintsa, and Corinua currently have four women and four men actively participating and attending to the health needs and births of the people in their respective communities.
In November, the Ecuador Jungle Mamas team conducted a participatory community evaluation and work plan meeting for 2011 in the community of Pumpuentsa. Achuar men and women actively engaged in generating ideas and activities for the upcoming year. In addition to continuing basic health and safe birthing workshops, the people are committed to working collectively in an effort to find solutions to contaminated water in the community that affects the health of men, women, and children. The community is in the process of drafting up a project proposal and a list of questions to ask an engineer who will eventually conduct a field study of local water conditions. The Jungle Mamas team is in the process of making partnerships and connections with organizations and individuals who work in clean water systems.
Recently, the local program coordinator, Narcisa Mashienta and Robin Fink, the Jungle Mamas program manager from Fundación Pachamama, traveled to San Francisco to create an activity plan for 2011 and a vision for the next four years. In addition, Narcisa Mashienta wowed Pachamama supporters and allies at the 2010 Fundraiser Luncheon with an important message brought from Achuar territory-- in order to make their dream of healthy rainforests and a healthy planet a reality, we must also make sure that the men and women protectors of these forests are empowered and healthy themselves. It is with this vision that Jungle Mamas is working so passionately to improve the health conditions of the Achuar people.
If you are in San Francisco, CA on December 14th, we invite you to join our monthly gathering which will feature Jungle Mamas Director Margaret Love giving a special presentation titled "Empowering Women & Communities: The Jungle Mamas Experience." Learn more about Jungle Mamas >>
