By Nick TichyOne of the biggest obstacles facing the communities CEN assists is a lack of economic opportunity. Because of this, one of CEN’s main priorities is to help the communities where we work create new income generation projects. This is complicated by the communities’ inexperience managing businesses and the few role models available to them.
One of the few bright spot enterprises in the community of
Maguary is the ecological "leather" bag-producing business
Couro Ecológico . This is an association of roughly 20 members who work a few hours a week in the business and share proceeds. Using an abundant and sustainable resource, natural rubber, this business has been making bags to sell to retailers in Brazil, the USA and Europe. While the enterprise shows promise, of the group's minimal business management experience results in underperformance. Finding a way to successfully manage, market, and sustain Couro Ecológico is a high priority for the community of Maguary. In support of this, CEN recently organized a group of MBA students from the
Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, to travel to Maguary to evaluate Couro Ecológico and provide consulting to improve the business.
Posted by: Jesse Brown in Maguary, JBTrip, Brazil on
Aug 24, 2007
Friday, August 24thThis morning we went to Ibama, the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment, to purchase our permits to enter the nature reserve in which Maguary is located. We were running rather late, and by the time we got there I realized that I was supposed to have brought my passport and didn't. But they gave me the permit anyways, phew! We caught the bus from the other side of town. When the bus stopped for a break, we realized that Arimar, the Manager of Couro Ecológica, whom we were going to Maguary to meet, was in fact on the bus. He spotted us and came to introduce himself. The bus took a couple of hours.
When we got to Maguary, I realized how different it was from Suruacá. First of all, Arimar got off the bus before we did - he is in the same community but lives way down the road from other people in the community. Thus Maguary is a lot more spread out. It doesn't have that same tightly-knit community feel that Suruacá did.
We got off at the stop for Dona Idu's house, the woman that we would be staying with. We are only here for one night, which is a bit odd, but due to the bus schedule and the timing of my flight back to Rio, that is the only way we could work it. I think Angela will be coming back, though.
Our Board Secretary, Jessie Brown and Vice President, Angela Viehmayer will travel to the Rio Tapajós next week to hold a teacher's workshop in Suruacá. The workshop will support a pilot project with which CEN is partnering with
Teachers without Borders and Brazilian NGO Link Social to improve teacher's skills and to help institutionalize a culture of learning and empowerment in schools.
During their stay in the region Angela and Jessie will also visit the community of Maguary.
This visit in also preparation for Angela's likely move to the region later this year to assume a role as Field Manager and begin implementation of the cCLEAR program. We will have more about this development this Fall.
