We help communities ejected against their will from their lands and even their countries to return and resettle: indigenous Guatemalan communities that fled to Mexico; civilians and veterans from El Salvador and Nicaragua; Saharawi refugees living in Algerian camps; indigenous communities of Chiapas; indigenous, black and peasant communities displaced in Colombia; Bedouin communities in Palestine, etc.

 

We aim to strengthen the socioeconomic self-sufficiency and the productive development of these communities, by means of the following measures: offering technical and administrative training; providing capital and consumer goods; promoting agricultural and livestock production; building and improving infrastructures; reforesting and protecting the environment. The kind of socioeconomic development we promote is the so-called popular economy. In popular economies -based on the concept of individual and social freedom and resistance to neoliberalism-, property adopts different organisational methods, such as the cooperative, individual self-management or the associations of producers-workers.

 

Their goal is for the people trained as promoters to become instructors in their own communities, so that they can meet their needs through self-development and self-organisation. Along with technical training, skills related to health and education are equally important. These programs are based on the conviction that investing in human capital is the best possible investment.

 

Supporting women and their initiatives from a perspective of emancipation is a strategic element. The final goal is the "empowerment of women" through different projects: production projects; training; support for organised women's groups, and credits for production and microcompanies. In the case of emergency actions, we promote the participation of women in the reception and distribution of food aid and consumer goods, strengthening their role in the community organisation.

 

One of our greatest challenges within the objective of achieving a participatory democracy is to contribute to the empowerment of citizens and local entities. We consider citizens' participation a democratic value in it, as it involves an expression of autonomy, freedom and struggle. That participation must not be restricted to the institutions; it must spread to the whole of society, by the recreation of local organisations and associative networks.