The Mountain Fund ~ News

After K2

2009-05-23T10:13:00.008-06:00

Photo: K2 copyright Nazir Sabir 2009

Sixteen people kneel in the main hall, hands cupped toward the sky. Children, their mothers, and their grandparents whisper a prayer. Nazir Sabir, one of the toughest mountaineers alive, weeps. From this village below a glacier, two men left for K2 and never returned. Karim Meherban and Jehan Baig were carpenters, men who climbed not because they wanted to but because their families needed the money. Their deaths and nine others splashed across television screens from Kansas to Karachi and made the cover of the New York Times. In the disaster, six children in Pakistan and three in Nepal lost their fathers. The Gerard McDonnell Memorial Fund is helping ensure these children get an education. Donors, many who have never worn crampons, contributed. The Meherban and Baigs' prayer was also for them.

Nazir stands. He thinks of his brother, buried beneath an avalanche thirty years ago. He passes donations into the hands of two widows and promises to return. The children watch him in silence, too young to understand contained within those envelopes is a future.

A. Padoan

Hunza, April 2009

Click HERE to learn more about the Gerard McDonnell Memorial Fund, a sponsor of these families.

At the Mountain Fund website, click on our Active Projects and scroll down to the Gerard McDonnell Memorial Fund.

You may also wish to read: K2: A Letter from Nazir Sabir

Healthcare in El Salvador

2009-03-11T18:21:00.000-06:00

One of the newest projects we're supporting is a fundraising project to benefit the people of Zaragoza, El Salvador. Noah Harper is the project leader, and his purpose is to help provide assistance to the public healthcare clinic in the village of Zaragoza.

This is the only public healthcare facility in the city, and serves a population of approximately 35,000 people. The supplies on hand are extremely minimal: one blood pressure cuff, 1 pair of crutches, no wheelchair, etc.

Click HERE if you wish to support this project.

A $4 Smile

2009-03-11T17:18:00.000-06:00

One of our projects, The North East India Project, has recently partnered with Smile Train; a non profit helping children with cleft palates. NEIP has recently sent two children in India, Alum and Tsuti, to a Smile Train doctor who has performed the first part of their cleft palate surgery; closing up the palate. Their second and final surgery, fixing their upper lip, will most likely be in 4-6 weeks, and will provide them with a new smile. The Smile Train doctor is located in Shillong, Meghalaya, which is over 300 miles from the children's village. Word is beginning to spread around the state of Nagaland, and we anticipate getting more requests to help from other areas very soon...

THIS PROJECT NEEDS YOUR HELP ~

We want to raise $1,000.00 by the end of March to help pay for the travel expenses and surgeries for two children. Our goal is to find 250 supporters who will donate $4.00 each. I'm sure if we all looked at our weekly spending habits, we could find $4.00 to spare. My family did!

If you know of others who would like to help out, please pass this on. The more we are able to raise, the more children we can help.

Click on these links for more information:
New Smiles Fund

Make a Donation

Thank you for your support!

What direction are you headed?

2009-02-15T07:50:00.000-07:00

What direction are you headed? Or perhaps I should rephrase the question to: "What is your 'Why' "? What inspires you? What Inspires The Mountain Fund?

Challenge. A global challenge. For all of us, not just the staff at The Mountain Fund. Consider these facts for a moment from United Nations Development Programme; Sustainable Human Development and UN Millennium Project.

1.2 billion people live on less than U.S.$1 dollar a day

Over half of the world's population - 3 billion people -lives on less than U.S.$2 per day

Every year, 6 million children die from malnutrition before their 5th birthday

Over 11 million children die each year from preventable causes like malaria, diarrhea and pneumonia

These are shocking figures that represent the staggering poverty that much of the world wakes up to on a daily basis.

The Mountainous Regions - Much of the poverty, lack of education, human rights violations, and lack of healthcare is in the mountainous countries of the world.

Nepal - 47% Unemployment - 42% of population below poverty - infant mortality rate 66/1000 - per capita income $210us

Peru - 9.6% Unemployment - 54% of population below poverty - infant mortality rate 31/1000 - 37% of population lives on under $2.00us per day

India - 9.2% unemployment - 25% below poverty - 56/1000 infant mortality rate

The countries in the list above are just a few of the places where The Mountain Fund has Member Agencies working to improve individual human rights, healthcare, education, clean up the environment and give a hand to those who need it most.

What inspires us is the work these organizations are doing everyday. As you visit our website, please take a moment to consider what your support means, the number of lives that you have the power to impact and the positive change that you can make in the world.

New Safe House for Women in Kathmandu, Nepal

2009-01-09T22:27:00.000-07:00

In Kathmandu, Nepal, many married and some unmarried women are abused on a daily basis. The Mountain Fund has recently opened a safe house to help provide a source of refuge for these women.

A recent "Foreign Policy" News Report, dated May 2008, has published a list of "The Worst Places to be a Woman". The female to male income ratio is 50:100, and the average literacy rate for females is 35%. The article goes on to say: "Marriage comes early in Nepal: Women born in the late 1970s married at a median age of 16. And motherhood is particularly dangerous. Nepal is the “deadliest place in the world to give birth outside Afghanistan and a clutch of countries in sub-Saharan Africa,” according to a 2006 report by the International Federation of the Red Cross. That’s because only about 1 in 5 births is attended by trained health personnel. But the government is taking steps to improve women’s lives: A quota system for women and minorities resulted in a third of the Constituent Assembly seats going to women in the April elections." [Click here to see the rest of the article]

In Kathmandu, most of these women’s families have turned them away. The safe house provides a secure environment for these women and their children to escape their abuse, to recover, and to become self sufficient.

They say there’s power in numbers, and we have partnered with The Women’s Foundation in Kathmandu, Nepal and with the Tessa Horan Foundation (located in Santa Fe, New Mexico).

The Women's Foundation has already built a great program, but that program is facing a crisis of capacity. They cannot provide enough housing for the women and children that have come seeking refuge and assistance in building a new life. By opening the safe house, The Mountain Fund is has added the additional capacity needed to continue an already successful and multi-faceted program. This house quickly and inexpensively adds the capacity needed.

In addition to offering a safe refuge for these women, we offer training programs to help them become self sufficent for their future. Some of our training programs include basic English language; computer skills; trek leadership; and organic gardening.

Click HERE to see more about this project and help support women in need.

Earth Spirit Rejuvenation: Supporting Projects in Indigenous Communities of the US and Bolivia

2008-11-21T16:12:00.000-07:00

New Mountain Fund partner, Earth Spirit Rejuvenation, works in the US and Bolivia to provide solutions to cultural, environmental, and economic challenges. Even though this new nonprofit has been in business less than six months, projects are already underway in Bolivia.

Bolivia: Artisan Cooperative and Water System Development

Bolivia is a country of diversity. It houses parts of the Amazon Rain Forest and the Andes Mountains as well as dozens of indigenous cultures. Most of the country’s people live on the high plain, the Altiplano, at 14,000 feet above sea level, surviving on little more than $2 per day per household.

ESR’s purpose in Bolivia is to facilitate:
• the development of artisan cooperatives that can produce desirable products for and find markets in Western countries;
• the exchange of quality artisan goods to the US and of much-needed capital to poor Bolivian families and communities;
• access to the technical expertise of Earth Spirit to help comm. unities develop priorities and specific plans to meet their water and sanitation needs;
• the connection of Bolivian communities with Bolivian nonprofits and businesses that will carry out the needed projects.

Andean Exchange (AEx) is the name they have given the alpaca marketplace for Earth Spirit Rejuvenation. Founding Director Jennifer Hamblen, a hydrologist and yoga instructor, is receiving shipments from three cooperatives which have a total of 110 artisans. She and her AEx partner Karla Tibbetts are busily canvassing the country to find consumers who appreciate intricately beautiful artisan clothing and want to help support indigenous communities. They recently sold the clothing at the Denver Food and Gift Show, where their clothing was a hit! Proceeds from this season’s sales will go to provide training and augment the resources and incomes of the artisan cooperatives as well as to specific community development projects.

This year, Karla and Jennifer will fund public showers in a small rural community, San Jose de Catagaita, which is hours by bus on dirt roads from the closest public shower. After the rainy season ends in June, the shower blocks will be installed, along with a rainwater catchment system on the roof of the school and two dry composting toilets, all funded by Earth Spirit Rejuvenation and TERRA Resource Development, Inc. (www.terradevelopment.org).

Donations go to support specific projects which are overseen and carried about by ESR in the US, and in conjunction with small, local nonprofits in Bolivia. Check out www.earthspiritrejuvenation.org to see how you can help through purchasing clothing, volunteering, and donating funds to specific projects described on their website.

Please contact Jennifer@earthspiritrejuvenation.org for more information.

Help the Children of Nepal

2008-06-24T22:41:00.000-06:00

The Social Development Centre Nepal has been in effect since 2006. It's a small home for orphans, and half-orphans (single parent invalid or not capable of caring for the child), located in the Kathmandu neighborhood of Khusibu near Naya Bazaar. Here, these children receive nourishment, shelter, education and medical attention.

At the time of this blog, there are currently 12 children at the centre, and one more will arrive within the week.

Through the combined volunteer efforts of many Nepali community members and international travelers, the orphanage is now being structured to become a sustainable and stable base for these children. This will give them the opportunity to grow up in Kathmandu, and to become healthy, educated and productive Nepali citizens.

The goal is to support these thirteen children as an independent, locally-run and member-funded orphanage. Operated on a completely volunteer basis with no overhead or administrative costs, this is an example of how the hard work of a few people can make a huge difference in the lives of others.

The Centre's director, Suzanne Clark, has created a fundraising page, with the help of The Mountain Fund. Her goal is to help raise the running costs of $800US per annum per child, to gain funds to change their residence to an accommodation which has water and to build a bank balance that will ensure a secure supply of food and education. Please click HERE to visit her fundraising page, and to help support this organization.

Thank you for your support!

[Note: The photo above shows the children in their school uniforms. The school fees and uniforms are generous donations from people who have met the children.]

The Mountain Fund and Adventure Engine Team Up for Nepal Trekking

2008-03-03T13:38:00.000-07:00

February 2008: The Mountain Fund and its Trek4Good program are proud to announce an exciting new partnership with Adventure Engine. Adventure Engine is an online administration suite providing everything from reservation programs, inventory management systems, merchant accounts, e commerce solutions, and marketing and distribution programs to adventure tourism suppliers, operators, outfitters and tour companies. The Mountain Fund is a US based charity with a mission to "organize grassroots non-profit and non-governmental organizations from a diversity of disciplines, and to support and coordinate these organizations' efforts to eliminate poverty, its causes and symptoms, in developing mountain communities around the world".

The Mountain Fund/Adventure Engine partnership will make it possible for trekking
agencies in Nepal [who subscribe to ethical treatment of porters, environmentally sound practices and a commitment to sustainable tourism], to access and use the powerful Adventure Engine. The Mountain Fund's Director, Scott MacLennan, says “Many good trekking agents in Nepal are at a market disadvantage in not being able to book online and take payments online. This is standard practice for Western companies, and Western clients have come to expect that level and ease of service. Asking clients to e-mail for information, or send credit card information in an e-mail, costs these companies business. This program will make all that possible and affordable.”

1% for the People:
One of the conditions of accessing Adventure Engine via The Mountain Fund is that 1% of all trip sales will go to The Mountain Fund to be invested in schools, health clinics and other projects in Nepal. It’s a total win-win. The agent gets an affordable, smart, easy-to-use system for booking online and taking secure credit card payments, while helping his/her local charities and schools earn money.

The idea of "1 Percent for the People" was first hatched by Danny Giovale, owner of Kahtoola Snow Shoes. For quite a while, there's been a "One Percent for the Planet" program which supports environnmental work, but what about the people? What about schools, health clinics and microfinance programs? Many people living in mountainous regions today know how to care for the natural environment, as it has been the source of their livelihood for generations. What they lack is access to healthcare, clean water, good education and capital to start businesses. That is what "1 Percent for the People" is all about, by tapping into the need for tour and trekking operators to have powerful, easy to use online booking systems to sell more trips and treks. "1 Percent for the People" makes it possible for trekking agents, hotel owners and tour operators in Nepal to make more money.

To learn more about these new programs, please contact The Mountain Fund's Director, Scott MacLennan, at mtnfund@mountainfund.org.

Moving Mountains in Nepal

2008-01-10T21:31:00.001-07:00

The Mountain Fund's
Moving Medical Camp in Kathmandu, Nepal

October 2007:

"Greetings from Kathmandu. The rainy season has gone on about a week longer than it should so it is hot in Kathmandu and will probably be warmer on the trek than I expected as well. I've had to change our itinerary slightly to account for a huge mudslide on the road we need to take. We will have to get off one bus, walk 2km and get on another bus. In case we have any further delay, I've added another clinic day in the area near the Karing For Kids clinic. That way, if we are delayed and can't make the clinic day at Gatlang, we'll have the next day to do a clinic in Chilime. What changes is that we are going to bypass the village of Briddam and go from Timure directly to Syabru. Briddam is well-off compared to everyone else in the area and there are nearly no children in that village. Briddam has a well known home-stay program, and all the children as a result, have ended up with sponors to attend school in Kathmandu. Revised itinerary is attached. Hoping for no further changes, and this is Nepal!"

~ Scott MacLennan, Founder of The Mountain Fund

Trek4Good is a charity trek program of The Mountain Fund. Click HERE to see more information about our treks.

The "Zack Martin Breaking Barriers" Grant

2007-12-15T09:58:00.000-07:00

Zack Martin died just before his 25th birthday on Thanksgiving Day 2002. He was a recipient of American Alpine Club grants, the Anatoli Boukreev grant and others. Zack was concerned about the general arrogance and self-serving aspirations of climbers and explorers.

His climbing resume reads like an adventure novel. His playground was the world, and included climbs in Spain, Peru, Mexico, Canada, Kazakhstan and most of the United States.

He committed that on all future expeditions he would not only climb and explore but more importantly he would perform humanitarian service in the local community. His plan was to “break a barrier” in the alpine environment, and “break a barrier” in the heart of man.

As Zack often said “The only barrier holding you back is yourself.”

In his memory, The American Alpine Club, a sponsor of The Mountain Fund, has created The Zack Martin Breaking Barriers Grant (ZMBB). This is a grant fund with a dual purpose.

The grant supports climbing and exploration in the alpine environment and coincidentally sponsors humanitarian and community outreach activities. Alpine proposals that focus on unclimbed or unexplored alpine terrain will receive special consideration especially lightweight and unsupported teams. Repeats of difficult or historic routes will also be considered heavily. However, the alpine objectives do not need to be at the leading edge of alpinism to receive this grant. Of equal or greater importance is the proposal for humanitarian activity. The primary consideration will be humanitarian and community outreach activities that meet the greatest human need in the local area of choice. It is not required that the alpine and humanitarian activities be in the same immediate local but in the same region is desirable.

This year, Fabrizio Zangrilli was the recipient of this award. He recently attempted a new route on K2 and though he was unsuccessful he (and Girls Educational International, another partner of The Mountain Fund) was successful with starting a school for girls in the Khane Valley in Pakistan.

Dougald MacDonald has written an article about Fabrizio's journey and you can find it by clicking HERE or use the URL: http://americanalpineclub.org/pages/story/5/62

Introducing "Art4Good"

2007-11-24T22:58:00.000-07:00

Introducing a new program of The Mountain Fund called "Art4Good"!

Our new program, Art4Good, is an online gallery created for the purposes of showcasing our members' talents and raising funds for the projects we support.

Our gallery includes images from some of the world's greatest mountain ranges; and currently features the following artists:

Carl R. Battreall & Alaska Wilderness Photography

Gregory William Frux

Jake Norton & Mountain World Photography

- and -

Our Founder, Scott MacLennan. We've selected a group of special photos taken from his treks in Nepal and Peru.

Art4Good is set-up for online ordering, however, you may also place an order via email. If you have any questions about this site; ordering; or donating your artwork, please contact the program manager, Jenn Spradlin, at jenn@mountainfund.org.

~ Thank you for your support!

The Mountain Fund & Trek4Good-Peru

2007-11-18T13:46:00.000-07:00

At least twice a year, "The Mountain Fund" travels to Peru. And during the past six years, we've had the pleasure of forming a personal friendship with our Peruvian guide, Yure Chavez. Yure has been guiding in Peru for over twelve years, and we highly recommend him for your trips to Peru.

In addition to conventional tours, he's led customized tours with tailor-made iteneraries, such as adventure, ecotourism, and bird watching. He's worked with a lot of American tourists, and can answer any of your travel related questions and concerns - including safety and health issues, best restaurants, etc.

Yure says: "Without ever compromising your safety and comfort, I'll take you well off the tourist paths into the real Peru, the country I know inside-out!"

Yure has the advantage of his in-depth knowledge about Peru, which comes from first-hand experiences of being a life-long native of Peru. He was born in Cusco, where he went to the University for five years to be licensed in tourism. His spoken and written English is excellent, and he's a terrific communicator. He also speaks Spanish, Quechua (local Peruvian language), and French.

Yure's got a great sense of humor, and is very involved with Andean Anthropological Studies (costumes, traditions and social customs). He's also got a real passion for helping his fellow Peruvians and giving back to his community. And, as program manager for "Peru Trek4Good", he donates a percentage of his profits to our Peru-based micro-finance program called Aynikuy. In Quechua, "Aynikuy" means to help each other or to cooperate.

We encourage you to visit Yure's blogspot and read more about his tours in Peru!

LINK: http://yurechavez.blogspot.com/

Medical Camp Moves Mountains in Nepal

2007-11-01T20:55:00.000-06:00

Kathmandu, Nepal
Oct 28, 2007

The October 11-24, 2007 "Moving Medical Camp", organized by The Mountain Fund , in cooperation with "Karing for Kids - Nepal" served over 1000 patients in seven villages.

The 25 member medical team which is composed of US, UK and Nepali Doctors and Nurses, as well as Nepali translators, visited 7 villages in the remote Rasuwa District on the Tibetan border, and just finished giving free medical care to over 1000 indigenous Tamang inhabitants of the area.

The medical team included OBGYN, Pediatric, Optometric and General Medicine practioneers. Over 225 eye patients received glasses and vision assistance. (A more detailed report will follow this press release.)

The Medical Team included, Michael Falcone, Dr. Beth-Hall Thompson, Tu Mach, Dr. Dorothy Kammerer-Doak, Susie Rivard-Dibenedetto, Shelly Ogle, David Diaz, Robert Doak, Lindsey Mahlstedt, Ann McCollum, Kerry Flint, Christina Quack, Peter Korpi, Katie Korpi, Puskar Gurung, Sudhir Lama, Dr. Alish Prajapati, Teja Raut, Sudha Dhungana, Kopila Lama, Phurbu Tamang, Dipendra Shrestha, Dipendra Lama, Nima Tamang and Jimyang Lama. Special thanks to Dr. Alish Prajapati who was our official medical host from Nepal.

Much thanks to Mountain Hardwear for the Space Stations that were used as portable clinic buildings and Phillips Environmental for the PETT toilet systems.

About The Mountain Fund:
Our mission is to organize grassroots non-profit and non- governmental organizations from a diversity of disciplines, and to support and coordinate these organizations' efforts to eliminate poverty, its causes and symptoms, in developing mountain communities around the world.

Website: http://www.mountainfund.org

About Karing For Kids - Nepal:
Karing for Kids - Nepal is a partner within The Mountain Fund, and has operated a Mother-Child Health Clinic in Goljung, Rasuwa, Nepal since the late 1990's.

Website: http://www.karingforkids.org

The Mountain Fund
Scott MacLennan
email: mtnfund@mountainfund.org

Search Engine Corp. Partners with The Mountain Fund to Generate Donations for Mountain Communities

2007-08-29T16:31:00.000-06:00

MountainSearch.org will donate half its advertising revenue to The Mountain Fund

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., Aug. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Mountain communities in developing countries are expected to receive significant supplemental funding each year from MountainSearch.org, a new search engine launched today through a strategic partnership between http://www.SearchEngineCorp.com, a custom search engine developer and The Mountain Fund, a non-profit organization devoted to eliminating the causes and symptoms of poverty in mountain cultures around the world.

MountainSearch.org, the advertiser-supported search engine available at http://www.MountainSearch.org, will donate 50 percent of its gross ad revenue to non-profit organizations supported by The Mountain Fund.

MountainSearch.org is a sister site to CatchTomorrow.org, http://www.CatchTomorrow.org and Charteroo.com, http://www.Charteroo.com, which were launched earlier this year to provide funding to public and charter schools on a similar basis. All of the sites were developed and are administered by Search Engine Corp., of Santa Fe, New Mexico, which plans to launch additional custom, web search engines in the coming months to support a range of social and philanthropic causes through advertising revenue generated by these sites.

"We are proud to partner with The Mountain Fund to help increase funding streams to non-profit groups supporting mountain communities," noted Search Engine Corp. founder and CEO Craig Romero. "By providing an easy way for citizens to donate without digging into their pockets, we can provide significant supplemental funding to help support these and other less fortunate communities."

As many as 800 million people are undernourished around the world. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), mountain communities are burdened by a disproportionately high number of malnourished people due to logistical challenges inherent in their locales.

In addition to the MountainSearch.org site, Search Engine Corp. also provides search functionality on The Mountain Fund home page, http://www.MountainFund.org.

"The MountainSearch.org search engine developed by Search Engine Corp. will aid The Mountain Fund in not only gaining much-needed funding for poverty stricken mountain communities, but also increasing awareness towards the need of proper education, healthcare and overall quality of life in these often-forgotten communities around the world," said Mountain Fund Executive Director, Scott MacLennan.

About Search Engine Corp.

Search Engine Corp. is the only custom search engine developer through which American Internet users can help fund a wide variety of charitable causes, including public and charter schools. Headquartered in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the company donates 50 percent of its gross revenue from the company's CatchTomorrow.org and Charteroo.com search engines. Based on the volume of site traffic, money is allocated to the school or school district designated for donations by individual users. For more information, please visit http://www.SearchEngineCorp.com or call 505.660.9916.

About Mountain Fund

The Mountain Fund is a global coalition of non-profit and non-governmental organizations devoted to eliminating the causes and symptoms of poverty in mountain cultures around the world. Based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, The Mountain Fund works to increase the capacity of these small, grassroots organizations by providing marketing, publicity, leadership consulting and valuable networking tools. The Mountain Fund also provides financial, administrative and technical assistance to its partner organizations. For more information, please visit http://www.mountainfund.org or call 800-743-1929.

Search Engine Corp.
CONTACT: Elin Spahr of Airfoil PR, +1-248-304-1412, spahr@airfoilpr.com,
for Search Engine Corp.

Web site: http://www.SearchEngineCorp.com/

http://www.MountainSearch.org/

http://www.MountainFund.org/

How Much Carbon Do You Produce?

2007-07-27T13:11:00.000-06:00

About Carbon Offsets:

Fact - We all emit carbon dioxide emissions when we drive, fly, use electricity, or generate waste.

Solution - Now you can actually invest in renewable energy and energy efficiency projects that reduce carbon emissions. So on the one hand, you produce, and on the other, you reduce.

We, The Mountain Fund, have teamed-up with our partner Sustainable Travel International, and have added a carbon calculator and offset program to our website. Please check it out and use it often. You'll feel a whole lot better about your own actions to combat global warming. It starts with you.

Calculate your personal Carbon Offset HERE.

Save our Surf, Snow, and H2o for Future Generations

2007-07-27T12:17:00.000-06:00

The Mountain Fund's partner, Save Our Snow Foundation, is on a mission to calculate, reduce, and offset greenhouse gas emissions and energy use, while also producing local alternative energy, and stimulating economic development for the outdoor sports industry.

Snow not only provides the medium for recreation in summer and winter sports, but also provides three quarters of the world's drinking water, irrigation for agriculture, and the key for life on our entire planet.

Hot dog super-skier Alision Gannett founded Save our Snow and has created a web site with tons of timely and useful information for ways we can reduce energy consumption and the resulting carbon release that comes from it.

Did you know...
+ The average home produces 12 tons (2,400 lbs.) of Carbon for heating and cooling.
+ An average car (20 MPG) -produces 6 tons (12,000 lbs.) of Carbon a year.
+ A medium flight round trip - 2.5 hours or 800 miles - produces 1.2 tons (2,400 lbs.) of Carbon.

You can take action! Buy renewable energy. Buy local, organic foods, clothing and products. Use Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs. Carpool, buy a hybrid or switch to biodiesel. Get an energy audit.

More about this foundation HERE.

How Green is Your Gear?

2007-07-20T10:22:00.000-06:00

Check out Sustainable Travel's GREEN List...

Outdoor equipment and clothing is enormously popular. According to the Outdoor Industry Association, 161.6 million Americans age 16 and up participated in at least one outdoor activity in 2005.

Unfortunately, many of these products are produced through intensive energy and resource use, under oppressive labor conditions or with harmful toxic materials.
For example, the EPA recently stated that Teflon is a likely human carcinogen, and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastic, which is widely-used in outdoor equipment, releases carcinogenic dioxin and is considered a health hazard from production through disposal.

The good news is that a growing number of companies have incorporated sustainable practices into their operations and are producing environmentally friendly products.

Sustainable Travel International, STI, has published a Green Gear Guide. The products described in the guide are produced using resource efficient, recycled, renewable, and or recyclable materials, and are offered by distributors that gain fair prices for the local producers of their goods, allowing you to enjoy the outdoors in a more eco-friendly manner.

We encourage you not to buy less, but buy better this summer. Remember corporations respond to consumer demand, so vote with your dollars!

Leave The World a Better Place...

2007-07-11T13:23:00.000-06:00

One of the first partners we had at The Mountain Fund was Sustainable Travel International. We think they're an awesome organization and a few minutes spent on their web site will convince you of that.

Their mission is to promote sustainable development and eco-friendly travel by providing programs that help travelers and travel-related companies protect the environmental, socio-cultural and economic needs of the places they visit, and the planet at large. While many parts of the world have taken a leadership role in creating and promoting sustainable travel and tourism initiatives, such as tourism certification and carbon-offset programs, similar programs are virtually non-existent in North America and many developing countries. They aim to change that.

STI's current priorities include:
· Provide educational resources to travelers and travel providers, and assist them in making positive contributions to environmental conservation and socio- cultural sustainability.

·Develop, adopt, and market sustainable tourism standards and practices through the "Sustainable Tourism Eco-Certification Program" (STEP)

· Enable and support the use of "MyClimate" carbon offset tickets, enabling travelers and travel providers to offset their climate impacts from air and land travel.

Sustainable Travel International now offers "MyClimate", a unique service that reduces greenhouse gas emissions. Through the "MyClimate" program, travelers, corporations, travel service providers, and academic institutions can take concrete action to fight climate change by investing in WWF-certified carbon offset projects that help to neutralize the negative impacts of their air and ground travel. Concern about the impacts of travel and tourism on the environment and local cultures has increased in recent years. In the US alone, nearly 55.1 million people express a preference for unique and culturally authentic travel experiences that protect and preserve the ecological and cultural environment.

Click HERE to visit their website.

Mountain Fund Staffer Featured on Yahoo's Hot Zone

2007-07-04T14:57:00.000-06:00

Jul 04, 2007 -- Christine Egger read a story about a boy trapped in a troubled life. Then she did something remarkable. She helped set him free.

More Than Talk-

After reading our story (Hot Zone's) about Yubaraj Khakada, a Nepalese teenage boy who dropped out of school to support his family as a parking attendant in Katmandu, Hot Zone reader and Mountain Fund staffer Christine Egger made it her personal mission to find a way to get him off the streets and back into school.

She reached out to other Hot Zone readers and through partnerships with the online philanthropy group GiveMeaning and the anti-poverty organization Mountain Fund she created a program which has already raised more than $7,500.

Christine has been relentless in her efforts to create sustainable assistance for Yubaraj. The program not only has put him back in school but may also expand to help other children from his village.

Christine visited Yubaraj in Nepal in March and sent us the following letter and photographs. We thank her for this wonderful example of commitment, perseverance and success in helping to change the life of another.
Dear Hot Zone Team,

"In February we wrote to let you know we were ready to enroll Yubaraj in school and were hoping to raise the funds we needed to do that. It is such a thrill to tell you that we reached that goal and Yubaraj is now a full- time student!!!!"

"The enclosed photos were taken in early March, when I had the chance to meet Yubaraj and our volunteers in Katmandu. It was thrilling, and surreal, to be actually talking with Yubaraj after thinking about him every day for almost a year!"

"We gathered at the Mountain Fund office just a few blocks from where Yubaraj had been parking motorcycles last year."

"Yubaraj gave the immediate impression of being just a really nice kid, incredibly grateful for what we were doing, and more than a little overwhelmed by it all. Aid workers Basu Gnawali, Scott MacLennan, Puskar Gurung, Sudhir Lama, and Phurbu Thokra were there too. Each of them have played a key role in this project and it was just wonderful to be able to see them with Yubaraj and to be able to say thank you in person for everything they'd done."

"Dinesh Wagle was there, too. He's the Nepali journalist and blogger who was with Kevin Sites when they met Yubaraj last May. Yubaraj was really happy to see Dinesh again and you should have seen the HUGE smile on Dinesh's face - he was obviously thrilled for Yubaraj that the Hot Zone article had had such an impact on his life."

"While we talked, Dinesh helped us explain to Yubaraj how all of this support for his education had come together. Yubaraj knew that his conversation with Kevin Sites had started a chain reaction, but he hadn't really understood just how many people had been affected by his story and how the Internet had connected all of them."

"We explained that the people who were helping him weren't wealthy or extraordinary, but that many people were giving what they could so that together we're able to support his education."

"Several people had written messages to Yubaraj on the GiveMeaning site, and we had them translated into Nepali so he could read their words of encouragement as he began the work of preparing for school."

Read the rest of the story and see the pictures HERE.

About The Mountain Fund -

Our mission is to organize grassroots non-profit and non-governmental organizations from a diversity of disciplines, and to support and coordinate these organizations' efforts to eliminate poverty, its causes and symptoms, in developing mountain communities.

Website: http://www.mountainfund.org

The Mountain Fund
Scott MacLennan
email: mtnfund@mountainfund.org
phone: 800-743-1929

Earth Day Cometh and Earth Day Goeth

2007-04-24T16:22:00.000-06:00

"Earth Day Cometh and Earth Day Goeth
And Where have all the Bees Gone?"

Earth Day Report by Captain Paul Watson

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.
- Albert Einstein
(1879 - 1955)

Earth Day is almost here. I don't believe in Earth Day myself. I think it's a little silly to devote one single day of the year to being concerned about the environment, but I suppose one day is better than no day at all.

Having been an environmental activist since 1968, I have seen the movement go up and down like a roller coaster in popularity. It was big in 1972 with the Environmental Conference in Stockholm which I attended and it became big again in 1992 with the U.N. Environmental Conference in Rio De Janeiro that I also attended. I remember that the priority issue in 1972 was the danger of escalating human populations but by 1992, that concern was not even on the agenda.

Well we are approaching the end of another 20 year period and it looks like ecology is in vogue again thanks to global warming and a few other scary things. Green is once again popular.

I can always tell when the environment is getting to be faddish again. My indicator is the number of lectures I am booked for around this time of year. It reached its peak in 1992, practically disappeared for awhile and now it's coming around again.

What worries me is that the movement is constantly being sidetracked by the issue of the day.

It's global warming now. When we were trying to warn people about global warming and climate change twenty years ago, no one was interested. Now it's become the "in" issue and the big organizations are tapping the public for donations to address the problem although no one has come up with anything that makes much sense. But global warming is good for business if you're one of the big bureaucratic organizations whose primary concern is really corporate self preservation.

Greenpeace is even telling people that they can slow down global warming by (and I kid you not) "singing in the shower". Yep, you see all you have to do is run the water, then get wet, shut the water off, and sing in the shower as you lather up and then open up the faucet and rinse off. Ah, so simple to save the world.

The problem is that these big organizations are to politically correct to address the ecologically correct solutions.

Instead they are baffling everyone with abstract concepts like carbon trading and carbon storage or trying to sell us a new hydrid Japanese car.

Even Al Gore with his Inconvenient Truth totally ignored the most inconvenient truth of all. I'll get to that in a moment.

But let's look at the number one cause of global greenhouse gas emissions.

First and foremost it is human over-population, the very same issue that was the priority concern at the 1972 United Nations Conference on the Environment in Stockholm.

It's 6.5 billion people folks.

Remember in 1950, the world population was 3 billion. It's now more than doubled.

6.5 billion people produce one hell of an annual output of waste and utilize an unbelievable amount of resources and energy.

And this number is rising minute by minute, day, by day, year by year.

And most of the people having children have no idea why they are even having children other than that's what you do. Most of them don't really love their children because if they did they would be very much involved in trying to ensure that their children have a world to survive in.

Unless over-population is addressed, there is absolutely no way of slowing down global greenhouse gas emissions.

But how do you do that within the context of economic systems that require larger and larger numbers to perform the essential task of consuming products?

Corporations need workers and buyers. Governments need tax-payers, bureaucrats and soldiers. More people means more money.

I've said for decades that the solution to all of our problems is simple. We just need to live in accordance with the three basic laws of ecology.

First is the Law of Diversity. The strength of an eco-system lies in diversity of species within it. Weaken diversity and the entire system will be weakened and will ultimately collapse.

Second is the Law of Interdependence. All of the species within an eco-system are interdependent. We need each other.

And the third law of Ecology is the Law of Finite Resources. There is a limit to growth because there is a limit to carrying capacity.

Human populations are exceeding ecological carrying capacity.

Exceeding ecological carrying capacity is diminishing both resources and diversity of species.

The diminishment of diversity is causing serious problems with interdependence.

Albert Einstein once wrote that "if the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man."

That is the Law of Interdependence.

Forget global warming folks. The disappearance of the honeybee could end our existence as human beings on this planet far sooner than we think.

And the honey bee is in fact now disappearing. Why? We don't know why. It could be genetically modified crops, I could be pesticides or it could be that our cell phones are interfering with their ability to navigate.

Whatever the cause the fact is that they are disappearing. All around the world bees are disappearing in a crisis called Colony Collapse Disorder.

And bees pollinate our plants. Everywhere on the planet, bees are hard at work making it possible for you to live and enjoy life.

We hold on to our place on this planet by only a toehold. If anything happens to the grass family, we are screwed. If the earthworms disappear, we are in big trouble. If the bees disappear, well according to Albert Einstein who was considered somewhat smarter than most of us, we will have only four years. Just enough time to get a college degree to discover that everything you learned is relatively useless when sitting on the doorstep of global ecological annihilation.

We are cutting down the forest and plundering the oceans of life. We are polluting the soil, the air and the water and we are rapidly running out of fresh water to drink.

Only corporations like Coke and Pepsi have figured out that water is more valuable than gold. That is why they are bottling it in plastic bottles and selling it. This week I saw a bottle of water in my hotel room that I could have drunk for only $4.

Unbelievable. That means that water is now being sold for more than the equivalent amount of gasoline. I hope that I'm not the only one who thinks this is insanity.

Now for Al Gore's really inconvenient truth. In his film he does not mention once that the meat and dairy industry that produces the bacon, the steaks, the chicken wings and the milk is a larger contributor to greenhouse gas emissions than the automobile industry. You see, Al may drive a Prius but he likes his burgers.

This is why the big organizations like Greenpeace and the Sierra Club will not say a thing about the meat industry. Last year I saw Greenpeacers sitting down for a baked fish meal onboard the Greenpeace ship Esperanza while engaged in a campaign to oppose over-fishing.

When we pointed out that our Sea Shepherd ships serve only vegan meals, the Greenpeace cook replied, "that's just silly."

We see what we want to see and we rationalize everything else.

The oceans have been plundered to the point that 90% of the fish have been removed from their eco-systems and at this very moment there is over 65,000 miles of long lines set in the Pacific Ocean alone and there are tens of thousands of fishing vessels scouring the seas in a rapacious quest to scoop up everything that swims or crawls.

This is ecological insanity.

The largest marine predator on the planet right now is the cow. More than half the fish taken from the sea is rendered into fish meal and fed to domestic livestock. Puffins are starving in the North sea to feed sand eels to chickens in Denmark. Sheep and pigs have replaced the shark and the sea lion as the dominant predators in the ocean and domestic house cats are eating more fish than all the world's seals combined. We are extracting some fifty to sixty fish from the sea to raise one farm raised salmon.

This is ecological insanity.

Yet the demand for shark fin is rising in China. Ignorant people still want to wear fur coats. In America, we order fries, a cheeseburger and a "diet" coke.

Ecological insanity folks.

Last week a reporter called to ask me if I had really said that earth worms are more important than people. I answered that yes I had. He then asked how I could justify such a statement.

"Simple," I answered. "Earthworms can live on the planet without people. We cannot live on the planet without earthworms thus from an ecological point of view, earthworms are more important than people."

He said that I was insane for suggesting such a ridiculous idea when people were made in the image of God, and earthworms were not.

What we have here of course is a failure to communicate between two radically different world views. His which is anthropocentric and sees reality as human centred and mine which is biocentric and sees reality as including all species equally working in interdependence. He sees us as divine and better than all the other species and I see us as a bunch of arrogant primates out of control.

But that's my two cents worth for Earth Day 2007.

Consider the humble honey bee and remember that the little black and yellow insect you see flitting busily from flower to flower is all that stands between us and our demise as a species on this planet.

We better see to it that they don't disappear.

(May be freely published and distributed)

Captain Paul Watson
Founder and President of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (1977-
Co-Founder - The Greenpeace Foundation (1972)
Co-Founder - Greenpeace International (1979)
Director of the Sierra Club USA (2003-2006)
Director - The Farley Mowat Institute
Director - www.harpseals.org

"Sail forth - steer for the deep waters only,
Reckless O soul, exploring, I with thee and thou with me,
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all."
- Walt Whitman

News from Shantidhara

2007-04-10T12:58:00.000-06:00

Educating India's Poor --

by Maria Jojayya Addagatla

The academic year 2005-2006 ended very successfully in May and after the annual examinations, the children went to their villages to spend their month long summer holidays. But for the staff, the holidays amounted to very few days indeed, as they continued their work of preparing and gathering the necessary things for the coming academic year such as tamarind, mango and tomato pickles.

As you all know, up to May of this year we had only 14 children at the hostel. Clara Gari (PILLALU Association), was supporting 9 children while another 5 children were being supported by Noor Gillani (PYAR Foundation). During Clara and Enrique's visit January 2006, Clara made an agreement with Shantidhara to support a further 10 children and also to support the further education of Sharuna (more about Sharuna's exam success below!). Every project has its ups and downs, and ours is no different. Unfortunately two children were forced to discontinue their studies because of irreparable family problems but on the other hand, Nikhil, whose parents withdrew him last year from the hostel, thankfully decided to send him back for this academic year and we are delighted to welcome him again.

Though Shantidhara receives many applications for admission to the hostel, we have personally visited all the applicant families and finally selected 12 very deserving poor children to fill the new places and the places vacated. We have also tried our best to maintain a good balance between girls and boys (13 boys and 11 Girls).

It was very difficult for the new children leaving their favorite village-squares and it took two weeks for all of us to accustom them to the life of the hostel and school, and to get them looked after properly with a lot of work such as haircuts, daily intensive baths, doctor's check ups and medications, nourishing food, teaching them new games etc., and now everyone is now very happy with life in the hostel.

Thank you dear friends.

Maria Jojayya Addagatla

Director

Machermo Open!

2007-04-10T12:56:00.000-06:00

Gorak Shep is Next --

by Community Action Nepal

The porter's shelter and rescue post at Machermo had an official grand opening in October. Mountain Fund is supporting the efforts of Community Action Nepal to build another facility at Gorak Shep.

To help build the Gorak Shep shelter, please make a donation today to the Mountain Fund under the category of Human Rights Programs.

Education in Nepal

2007-04-10T12:53:00.000-06:00

Maya Foundation --
by Rene Voss

I came to Nepal for the first time in 2003. I discovered a beautiful country with lovely people. However, my enchantment turned into despair when I came into contact with the Nepali educational system in a small rural community in the foothills of the Annapurnas. I volunteered to teach at the local primary school and after a year I started the Maya Foundation to promote help to the Nepalese schoolchildren at a truly grassroots level. Three years later, I still live in the same community.

The government in Nepal has only been active in the field of education for the past 50 years. Its focus is still on school buildings. Teachers, supplies and the quality of teaching are completely outside the scope of the government’s policy. In Nepal, education in the rural areas still and foremost takes the form of rote learning. The teacher talks (usually with a load voice; therefore to scream better describes the vocal activity of a Nepali teacher) and the children listen. The teachers try to drill knowledge into young brains, with the help of a bamboo stick if needed. There are no teaching materials whatsoever; there is no learning through playing or learning through doing; there are no activities, neither single nor in small groups; there is no stage in the learning process of practicing or producing anything with the knowledge acquired. Today, in rural Nepal, the approach is clearly teacher oriented.

Our vision, at the Maya Foundation, is child oriented; we look at education through the eyes of the child. Children need an affectionate and inspiring environment in which they can develop fully and become who they really are—beautiful children of Mother Earth.

Global context of the need for Early Childhood Education In 1990, 155 countries drafted the World Declaration on Education for All (EFA). Almost two decades ago, the importance of early childhood education was already stated. Unfortunately, in the rural areas of Nepal, not much was really done about it. It wasn’t until the beginning of 2006 that UNESCO, through its daughter organization IIEP, finally gave full attention to it. If the vicious cycle of inequality is to be broken, then child care and education have to start very early, before primary school. In most developing countries, early childhood education is restricted to urban middle-class children. Children from rural areas and low-income families not only are denied access to this kind of education, but they enter primary school later than other children. If inequalities are to be reduced, and if education is to benefit disadvantaged children, much more attention has to be given to providing early childhood care and education for the poor. And while it is great to finally have recognition for it, what children really need in rural Nepal today is the actual early childhood center, free of charge, with the actual teachers and the actual teaching materials to bring it into their daily lives and to make it all happen. Talking is fine for policy makers, but children living under poor conditions need actions, not words.

Actions:

The Maya Foundation The Maya Foundation is doing just that: opening up early childhood centers in rural Nepal. In 2004 it opened its first center in a small village in the foothills of the Annapurnas. As it was very popular with the local people from the start, it has welcomed many preschool children. In 2005 it received an honorable mention from the Nepali Ministry of Education. In the same year we opened up a workshop where local people craft educational materials that otherwise we would not be able to get hold of in Nepal. Obviously we are on the right track. All we want now is to continue constructing and equipping more early childhood centers, training more nursery class teachers, instructing more locals how to create high quality educational materials. Because these children deserve our care and attention. To be able to do this, however, we need your help! Please donate towards the future of the children of Nepal. Together with the Maya Foundation you can make the difference!

The Maya Foundation is a partner of The Mountain Fund for positive change in Nepal. To support them please make a donation today to Youth and Children's Programs at The Mountain Fund.

Building a Better Playground for All

2007-04-10T12:48:00.000-06:00

Social responsibility can be natural for outdoor enthusiasts -
by John Antos

As an outdoor enthusiast you understand the strong connection between humans and nature. Outdoor enthusiasts also recognize the undeniable connection between the impoverished people living in the world’s mountainous regions and what a thriving outdoor industry can do to help these people continue to survive.

The mountains are our playground, and the care of the people and environment that make up that playground is our direct concern. Just as many outdoor enthusiasts are sensitive to environmental threats to the mountainous regions that we enjoy, so to must they be sensitive to doing business with socially responsible companies when it comes to the improvement of the lives of the local populations in these areas.

To be sure, the outdoor industry has been both responsible for some of the problems as well as potentially being a large part of the solution for bringing help to these impoverished mountain people.

For example, tens-of-thousands of men and women are employed as porters in the trekking industry in Peru, Nepal and Tanzania. Currently, neither the large international aid organizations nor the global donor community recognize the issue of these porters’ working conditions. Many outdoor enthusiasts have come into direct contact with these porters during their journeys. While the providing of employment is a plus, the poor conditions under which they work cannot be overlooked by outdoor enthusiasts who have trekked with them. With so many other problems in the world, decades may pass before the treatment of trekking porters makes it on to the agendas of the international community.

Making a Difference.

This is your chance to make a difference and improve the mountain playground you enjoy for yourself, the environment, and the impoverished people who live there. The companies that support The Mountain Fund recognize that their success and the success of the mountain community are linked. They further recognize that they can, through their support of The Mountain Fund have direct impact on the plight of porters and other key issues facing the mountainous regions of our world. Our supporters also have discovered some powerful business reasons for becoming involved with the work of The Mountain Fund.

8 in 10 Americans say that corporate support of causes winds their trust in a company. That number is up 21% since 1997, proof that customers are paying attention

86% of Americans say that they are likely to switch from one brand to another that is about the same price and quality if the other brand is associated with a cause. Proof that customers are loyal to companies they see as responsible.

72% of employed Americans would choose to work for a company that supports charitable causes when deciding between two otherwise comparable job offers.

Spending on cause related marketing is up 20% from 2005 and will reach $1.3 billion in 2006. The companies spending that kind of money on cause related marketing read the first three statements and clearly saw the trend.

Call to Action – Make a Difference Today.

Basic corporate support of The Mountain Fund starts at only $250 a year. To understand the magnitude of this gift: Our volunteers spend more than $250 buying outdoor equipment for a single Mountain Fund trek; that same $250 can make a substantial improvement in many impoverished mountain areas. We appreciate these generous gifts and we support these companies who support us by wearing their logos on our volunteer trips. It’s not just about doing the right thing. It’s about inspiring social change while inspiring consumer consumption. Good deeds and good companies, more than ever, just naturally go together. Contact us for more information on becoming a supporter.

Couriers Needed - Nepal & Tanzania

2007-04-10T12:45:00.000-06:00

Porter Gear Stuck in the US

by IMEC

Carry clothing to Nepal or Tanzania: The Porter project is always looking for people and companies who will carry clothing to Nepal and Africa, please contact us if you know anyone who can help. You will be met at the airport by a representative - and gain a ride to your hotel into the bargain.

For more details email info@hec.org.

Horan Fund Issues Challenge Grant

2007-04-10T12:43:00.000-06:00

Make your donation go further --

The Tessa Marie Horan Fund has awarded us with three challenge grants. Please take up the challenge and help us match them.

$5000 to operate the Volunteer Visitor Center in Nepal
$1800 to sponsor a women's outdoor education program in Nepal
$780 to sponsor one girl for one year at the Himalaya House in Pokhara Nepal

With your help we can make these generous grants go further. Please match them today.

Tessa Marie Horan died on February 1, 2006 on the island of Va’vau in the Kingdom of Tonga. She was killed in a shark attack. Tessa was in Tonga as a Peace Corp volunteer.

NOLS and Mountain Fund

2007-04-10T12:38:00.000-06:00

National Outdoor Leadership School & Mountain Fund:

by Lea Weston

In an article in the last issue of this newsletter we told the story of Oksana Polonskaya, a former orphan from Bishkek, and her quest to lead others like herself on trips to the mountains of Kyrgisthan. We complete that story in this issue with a note of gratitude we've received from Oksana. That isn’t the real end of this story, however. NOLS, or National Outdoor Leadership School, the countries premier school for outdoor leadership skills and Mountain Fund have a commitment to each other for continuing programs. We are presently discussing the possibility of having an NOLS instructor assist with one of the outdoor courses run by Empowering Women of Nepal as well as looking at future exchanges of young men and women from both Central Asia and Nepal and having them attend outdoor leadership courses at NOLS.

Attending NOLS courses is a superb way to positively impact the future of hiking and trekking in these regions of the world. For tourism to succeed in the long run, it has to be sustainable and protective of the natural resources that tourists are going to admire. NOLS courses are a great way for sustainable tourism practices to be taught to young guides just starting out. We are confident that over time our partnership with NOLS will have lasting positive impact on the tourism practices in mountain regions.

In her online journal, Oksana Polonskaya shares how the NOLS experience has influenced her outdoor leadership abilities and practices.

" Trip of My Dreams-

The first time I heard about NOLS was from an American friend of mine, Molly Loomis, a NOLS instructor . . . This wilderness leadership course sounded like a lot of fun to me. I knew that a lot of people were proud of me because they knew I was trying very hard, especially since I was a girl who grew up in a Kyrgyz children’s home. I got a lot of new skills and now I am happy to be back home to continue working with the Alpine Fund and share my new experience with the kids.

For example, I have never heard anything about “Leave No Trace Principles” but they are very important. The kids have never heard about these principles either. So, I decided this would be something really good for the kids to know about.

I planned the lesson on the seven principles of Leave No Trace as taught to me at NOLS. [The kids] gave me examples of seeing a lot of people leaving trash after camping, making fires, and being disrespectful to the environment. They understood that this is not good and might cause a lot of problems in the future . . . It was uplifting to see that having gained an appreciation for the wonders of the wilderness, the children were eager to care for these wild places as well.

I learned a lot on my NOLS semester last summer. There are all kinds of interesting and useful things that I want to teach the kids now. "
- Oksana Polonskaya

The Mountain Fund is looking forward to a long and beneficial relationship with NOLS. We are deeply grateful for the opportunity provided Oksana.

Tales from Peru

2007-04-10T12:36:00.000-06:00

Arrerios, Street Vendors and other tales from Peru:

At nearly 16,000 feet in the Andes the sun is relentless. Moments after it sets the temperature plunges, the stars come out and the cold Andean night begins. Five Mountain Fund supporters have just returned from this land of contrast and a successful circumnavigation of the beautiful Nevado Ausangate massif.

Southeast of Cuzco, the awesome Cordillera Vilcanota includes a number of peaks of which Ausangate is the highest at 20,945 feet (6,384 meters). On a clear day, the peak is visible from Cuzco. The snow-capped peaks of this area offer spectacular mountain scenery, hot springs, turquoise lakes, glaciers, herds of llamas and alpacas, picturesque villages and traditionally dressed Indians. The seven day circular trek starts and finishes at the small Andean village of Tinqui and takes you around the massif of Ausangate and over three high passes (two of them over 5000m).

Prior to undertaking the trek of Ausangate, we spent one week touring the major Inca sites that populate the Sacred Valley and the city of Cuzsco. All of us marveled at the craftsmanship of the Inca builders in Pisac, Ollantaytambo and Machu Picchu. In the week preceding the trek we also got to know our guide, Freddie. We came to appreciate his knowledge of the culture from which he has descended as well as his pride in the history of his country.

The people that live in the high Andean landscape are tough; there is just no other way to put it. The extremes of landscape and temperatures demand it of them. Our ‘arrerios’, for example, are some of the hardest working and most rugged people I have ever had the pleasure to know. ‘Arrerios’ are the horsemen who rise every morning, long before us we trekkers , and greet us with hot drinks and hot water for washing. They leave camp after we do and in spite of the fact they have to take down the tents and pack everything on the horses and prepare a lunch for us to take with us, they appear, as if by magic, at the next night’s camp ahead of us. We see them setting up the tents in the distance and by the time we arrive our dining tent is up and hot drinks and a snack are waiting. I really have yet to figure out how they do it.

The arrerios aren’t just tough, they are also very caring and compassionate - rugged and gentle at the same time. About the third or perhaps it was the fourth day on the trek I came down with an illness that I’ll delicately refer to as Inca revenge. By the third day without food I was becoming very cold as we approached our final pass over the 15,000 feet mark. Even though I was wearing a down jacket and my insulated belay pants, my body had nothing to create heat with. I staggered behind Jose, old Jose that is, (his son, young Jose was with us as well) rumored to be anywhere from 60-70 depending on who you asked. I was just about to complain of the cold when I noticed that Jose was wearing the classic rubber sandals of this regions, with no socks, had no gloves on and was wearing only the light rain jacket I had given him at the start of the trip. Even in my diminished state it was clear that to complain of cold to a man with bare feet and a windbreaker would have been a cowardly act on my part. Jose speaks Quechua, and I don’t, so the language barrier may have saved me from making any remarks as well. Jose had been walking with me for three days now to make certain that if I became too sick to walk, I could ride the horse he was leading. Every half an hour or so he’d stop and point at the horse, a gesture that clearly meant that as far as he was concerned I ought to be riding it and not trying be macho about things.

Less than twelve hours later I had recovered enough to share a few beers with these guys while soaking in some hot springs. That evening we dined together on a feast they had prepared in the tradition of the high Andes, Pachamanca. This important part of Peruvian cuisine , has existed since the time of the Incan Empire. Preparation begins with the heating of stones over a fire, and the meat (typically lamb) is then placed on top. The fire is covered with grass and earth, and the resulting oven is opened up after a couple of hours and the feast is served!

We had a great trip, even with the illness I loved it. As one participant noted, after every pass the scenery would open into another valley that was always, if such is possible, even more beautiful than the one before. Several members of our group tried out inflatable kayaks in a glacial lake at 15,000 feet. The arrerios were enthralled with the whole kayak business and each took a turn paddling the lake with huge smiles on their faces. I think for me personally, the moments of care and compassion shown by our arrerios will always stay with me as the true high point of this trip. Mountains are indeed beautiful places, magical places too. I don’t think anything is more magical and beautiful, though, than the friendships I have with these arrerios -, my proud, tough and kind kings of these mountains.

I think all of us felt good knowing that our trip had raised much needed money that will be used as micro- loans to help people in Peru start small business, purchase a street-vending cart and inventory. These are fine, hardworking people. Access to capital is very difficult and yet even a modest amount can make all the difference in the world for them. Our program, called Aynikuy, is making small loans available at terms that are within the reach of the people needing them. Peru gave all of us on this trip wonderful times, hospitality and friendship. It’s great to be giving something back to Peru.

Mountain Fund Projects for 2007

2007-04-10T12:32:00.000-06:00

Mountain Fund Projects for 2007 - Please give them your support.

Nepal - Everest Region. Mountain Fund will sponsor a research project in the Everest region that will document and examine the impact of tourism and provide guidance to the local populations on how to manage resources for the future. The research team of A. Lew, K. Tatsugawa, and G. Nyaupane will begin work in January of 2007.
Nepal - Gerku School. In November 2007 Mountain Fund will host a work team for the reconstruction of the school in the village of Gerkhu. The school serves approximately 100 children in the area but has fallen into serious disrepair. Mountain Fund work teams will spend two weeks bringing the buildings back to useable and safe conditions.

Peru - Medical Assistance. Not far from Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley, Mountain Fund partner Reach out Children's Fund has been key in improving education and educational facilities to the 250 student attending the Huilloc school. Recently we were informed of the dire medical needs of these children. The following message was sent to us by the Reach Out Children's Fund.

The biggest battle for us is health care. The children never see a doctor and have yet to see a dentist. The biggest issues in the village are: dysentery, broken bones, infected teeth, cataracts and frostbite due to the high altitude.

In July 2007 Mountain Fund will host a trip to Peru to offer medical care and assistance to these children. The 16 day trip will include a tour of the Inka sites, including Machu Pichuu.

Nepal - Volunteers. The Mountain Fund Volunteer Visitor Center is now open in Kathmandu. This provides the only central source of information for anyone looking to do volunteer work in Nepal. Volunteering contributes an incredible 5% of GNP to Nepal. With peace at last in Nepal, more people than ever are trying to find out volunteer opportunities. The Mountain Fund Volunteer Visitor Center is a veritable one-stop shopping experience for volunteer opportunities in Nepal.

Peru - Microfinance. In September 2007 Mountain Fund will repeat the popular Ausangate Trek Fund Raiser for our micro finance program in Cusco. Last year we had five guests and great time. All profits go to Ainkuy, the street vendor loan program we have in Peru.

Nepal - Moving Medical Clinic. In October 2007 Mountain Fund is hosting a two-week moving medical clinic in the remote Rasuwa district of Nepal. Starting at the Karing for Kids clinic in Goljung, we'll trek the entire Tamang Heritage Trail and stop every other day to set up a health clinic. A medical staff of fifteen will spend the entire day treating anyone that comes in the door. Then we pack up and repeat the clinic in the next village up the trail. Mountain Hardwear generously provided us the with tents needed for this clinic including the main portable clinic itself, a giant Mountain Hardwear Space Station.

Nepal- Early Childhood Education. Mountain Fund has made a commitment to our partner Maya Foundation to help establish a pilot program for early childhood education in Nepal.

In 1990, 155 countries drafted the World Declaration on Education for All (EFA). Almost two decades ago, the importance of early childhood education was already stated. Unfortunately, in the rural areas of Nepal, not much was really done about it.

It wasn’t until the beginning of 2006 that UNESCO, through its daughter organization IIEP, finally gave full attention to it.

If the vicious cycle of inequality is to be broken, then child care and education have to start very early, before primary school. In most developing countries, early childhood education is restricted to urban middle-class children. Children from rural areas and low-income families not only are denied access to this kind of education, but they enter primary school later than other children. If inequalities are to be reduced, and if education is to benefit disadvantaged children, much more attention has to be given to providing early childhood care and education--- for the poor.

Peru - Enthnomusicology. The Q’eros people in the southern Perúvian Andes have maintained indigenous traditions, such as music, weaving and spiritual practices, that many other Andean communities have lost.

Holly Wissler has been an adventure travel guide in the Andes of Peru since 1982 and Himalayas of Nepal since 1987. She holds double masters degrees from the University of Idaho in Flute Performance and Music History. She is the producer of the 1998 video documentary Qoyllur Ri’ti: A Woman’s Journey, about the large pilgrimage festival in Peru known as Qoyllur Rit’i and her inside role as mayordoma (sponsor) of a dance group. She is currently on a Fulbright-Hays grant conducting doctoral dissertation research on the musical traditions and modernization of the isolated Quechua community of Q’eros in the southern Andes of Peru. During her fieldwork Holly has video-taped over thirty hours of rare and unique video footage of Q’eros musical rituals and is fund-raising to produce a video documentary about Q’eros’ traditional music. This is the first in a series of on-going documentation projects about Q’eros music, to include CD recordings and an on-line digital archive.

Mountain Fund is proud to be helping Holly create the video and document this fast vanishing way of life.

Uganda - Women's Employment Program. Working with our new partner and uber-energy person, Alison Levine, founder of ClimbHigh Foundation we hope to increase employment opportunities for women in nontraditional roles, such as guiding and portering in the climbing industry.

ClimbHigh needs immediate donations of clean, synthetic sleeping bags for women it now has employed in the Rwenzori Mountains. Learn more here.

Ongoing Projects. In addition to some of our new projects we continue to work with and support dozens of programs being run by small, local organizations in Peru, Nepal and Central Asia. We will continue to support and help these organizations grow and prosper in 2007.

In some cases the support from The Mountain Fund has been the lifeline that keeps these projects open and running. The Karing for Kids clinic in Goljung, Nepal is one example of a project that depends almost entirely on our help to keep the clinic open.

In 2006, The Mountain Fund made grants totaling nearly $18,000 to programs like Karing for Kids. In 2007 we hope to raise that amount to $25,000. With your help, we will reach that goal.

Partnership is Power

2007-04-10T12:29:00.000-06:00

Poverty, a puzzle with many pieces.

Partnership is power. This axiom is the underlying principle behind all we do at Mountain Fund. Village issues in any of the mountain areas where we work are multi-faceted and require a multidisciplinary approach to succeed.

Introducing health care, for example, to an area may lead to lower infant and maternal mortality rates which in turn means that more pressure is put upon the natural resources of the area to support the increased population.

Healthcare systems alone cannot remedy underlying health issues from the environment i.e. unsafe water supplies, unhealthy indoor air quality. Those issues require engineering expertise to resolve. Also, public health education is critical to reduce transmission of disease. Assuming that local health conditions improve and mortality rates decline, new issues will be faced by the village, such as, how to feed the extra mouths, how to educate the additional children, how to find fuel for cooking without further degradation of the natural environment and how to create sustainable agriculture in areas with limited growing seasons.

Tinkering with any part of the balance will result in unintended consequences. That's why Mountain Fund has so many partners with such a diversity of skills and backgrounds.

In 2006, together with our partner organizations, we have made tremendous progress and incredible accomplishments. Here are some brief highlights of our work in 2006.

Porters Rights. We formed the Mountain Porter Concern Group in Kathmandu. Comprised of representatives from Porter's Progress, International Porter Protection Group (IPPG) and International Mountain Explorers, this group meets monthly to discuss ways that they can cooperate and collaborate on projects to help create better conditions for porters in Nepal. This group represents a real step forward in cooperation between these porter advocacy groups. The meetings are organized by Mountain Fund staff working in Kathmandu. We also helped Community Action Nepal (CAN) and IPPG with the Machermo Hut for porters this year by making a donation toward the cost of a solar system for the hut. In 2007 we'll be working with CAN to realize the dream of another hut at Gorak Shep.

Economic Progress for Peru. In September we organized and lead a high Andes trek as a fund raising event for Aynikuy, our micro-finance program in Peru. Five guests from all over the US joined us and made this trek a huge success.

Healthcare. Working with Dan Mazur's Summitclimb we helped to make possible a trip that established a new clinic at Patale, the "wrong side" of Everest. The medical team treated over 100 patients during this trip, some of whom walked over two days to reach the clinic.

Women's Programs. We organized attendance at a NOLS course for Oksana Polonskaya from Bishkek and now she is back teaching other youth about first aid and the Leave No Trace ethics she learned during that course. NOLS and Mountain Fund will be partnering again in 2007 to help bolster the outdoor leadership program run by EWN in Pokhara, Nepal. We'll also be working with ClimbHigh Foundation in Africa. See stories in this issue.

Youth Programs. Working with our partner Empowering Women of Nepal we opened Himalaya House in Pokhara this year. Himalaya House provides a safe home and education to young girls who were sold into servitude, often by their own families. Himalaya House is now home to 15 such girls who have a home environment that is safe and supportive. They are all attending school now too.

These are just a few of the 2006 highlights. We continue everyday to support health programs, schools, women's training, youth programs, porters programs and environmental programs in mountainous regions throughout the world. Thanks for your help in making this possible.

Alpine Fund Brings Adventure to At-Risk Youth

2007-04-10T12:16:00.000-06:00

Below are excerpts from the Alpine Fund's February 2006, Report to Board of Advisors.
Alpine Fund continued to utilize its Alpine Learning Center, with two more weekend trips.

The Alpine Fund first worked with the Voenna Antonovka orphanage five years ago on its inaugural hike. The tradition of working together was continued for their first dacha trip this winter. Important to me, this marked the third separate group to attend the dacha.

In other words, the Alpine Fund is spreading its wings, and reaching out to a broader spectrum of kids. It is a delicate task to balance our goals of making genuine impacts and fostering relationships with kids, versus just serving as many as we possibly can. I personally believe we are currently striking that balance as well as we can.

It has been our goal to work with two orphanages, plus our English students, and we have accomplished that.

Trip 1

The weather, more than anything, threatened to frustrate the weekend, as rain poured down Friday night, following a week of Spring-like temperatures.

The group arrived on time at the dacha. Another wonderful lunch prepared by Arianna was had, followed by a quick turnaround, and out the door for our local peak – known now as Pik Alpine Fund. Fog rolled in and out, and snow blew sideways for the duration of the hike. There was no view, but the kids delighted in their first peak, and were remarkably upbeat and enthusiastic. It was a good start.

Things soured late in the evening, when our guest troublemaker (one of the more frustrated young boys), could not keep his insulting comments, meant for our ethnic Kyrgyz girls, to himself. Some tactful intervention and conflict resolution had us sleeping again, but not before some bad feelings set in amongst the group. This incident proved a bit of a turning point in the weekend. The mood was dampened for sure.

Trip 2

The "English class boys" joined us on the most recent trip. After the previous trips with large groups, planning and prepping for these guys was a piece of cake. They are extremely helpful and attentive. They enjoy themselves and genuinely take something positive away from their time in the mountains.

We hiked Pik Alpine Fund (the first time for this group) and added a round of Frisbee on the summit for kicks. Besides Frisbee, we enjoyed sweets, local bread and tea while soaking up the sun and excellent views.

The following day was augmented by a visit form a local naturalist who works for a snow leopard trust. His great demeanor, excellent photos (of snow leopards!), and enthusiasm for the subject made for a fun few hours. He joined us on a shorter hike up a local creek bed and we looked for some interesting animal tracks. Things ended well and we headed home in good spirits.

Conclusions

The hardest part is behind us in many ways. Regular trips are up and running with largely positive results. The trouble presented the other week amongst our group from Antonovka is not out of the ordinary. In many ways, I'm surprised there are not more problems. Instead, the kids have been thankful, upbeat, and pretty well self-motivated.

The challenge in the future will be to continue funding our operations, and keeping up the enthusiasm amongst volunteers and staff for continued trips.

Matt Klick

Poverty with a View

2007-04-10T12:13:00.000-06:00

Life in the World's Mountainous Regions:

Shiprock stands as a solitary sentry over the desert of the Four Corners area. To the Navajo Tse Bi dahi, or "the rock with wings", is a sacred place. This rock was once a great bird that carried the ancestors of the Navajo to safety in Northwest New Mexico when fleeing a warring tribe.

Adventure athletes express reverie for mountains of rock and ice in their own way. The Alps were climbed in the 1800's and Everest's summit was first reached in 1953. Sir George Everest, a British surveyor-general of India, had his name bestowed upon the world's tallest mountain in 1865. Tibetans call the mountain Chomolungma, mother goddess of the universe. When early adventurers first began exploring the slopes of the Himalayan giant, local people were mystified and a little frightened. Locals were amazed that anyone would want to visit the top of the mountain and scared of the possible consequences that could ensue when one offended the mountain gods.

A close friend who pioneered a climbing route on the Ship Rock monolith had to obtain tribal permission to climb there. Sacred sites are not always respected however. Devil's Tower in Wyoming continues to be one sacred site where a few rock climbers persist in climbing during tribal holy days in spite of repeated requests to curtail such activities at those times.

Natural Resources:
The mountainous regions of the world are repositories of natural resources that we depend upon. Forests are harvested for lumber and mountainsides are excavated for minerals. Freshwater is born from snow and glacier melt in the high peaks and nourishes plants and animals, including people, throughout its journey to the ocean. The headwaters of the Colorado River, one of the most important rivers in the Western US, are high in the alpine tundra of Rocky Mountain National Park.

The protection of mountains and natural resources such as plants, water sources and wild life has become a pressing issue that people need to be aware of. Mountain soil and vegetation are easily, and sometimes permanently, lost to erosion when natural resources are exploited in an unsustainable manner.

The degradation of mountain ecosystems directly affects nearly half the world's population, including both highland and lowland communities. According to the International Year of the Mountain, an initiative started by UNESCO, "degradation of mountain environments poses a serious threat to the world's biodiversity and food security. Specially adapted to a wide range of altitudes and climates, mountain ecosystems have produced a wealth of plant and animal species..."

Mountain People In an area so rich with natural resources you would think that there would be plenty to eat. Sadly, the opposite is true; many of the 800 million chronically undernourished people in the world live in mountainous areas. While rivers flow freely, mountainous areas are defined by their inaccessibility. Urban areas are typically far away. Roads when they exist at all are often impassable for much of the year due to weather, rockslides, avalanche and flooding.

In Peru, one small single-track dirt road leads to the village of Tinqui, the traditional starting point for the trek to Nevado Ausangate. Ausangate is considered sacred by the people of the high Andes and in another sense became sacred to climbers and trekkers following its first ascent in 1953 by a German team that included Heinrich Harrer, author of Seven Years in Tibet and member of the climbing party that summated the infamous north face in 1938. When I was last in Peru the price of gas was approaching $12 a gallon. Bringing tools, food and other supplies to this tiny mountain hamlet is a difficult and expensive undertaking

Langtang, Nepal is a three day trek from the nearest road. The nearest road is a 12 hour drive from Kathmandu over a bone jarring 4wd road. Were it not for the fact that Lantang is still a fairly popular trekking destination, very little in the way of building materials, food, fuel or other supplies would ever arrive there. As it is, all supplies to Langtang and several smaller villages in the area are transported by human porters whom often carry loads equal to, or greater than, their body weight for wages of less than one dollar per day.

The Tamang villages that lie a few miles west of the terminus of the Langtang approach road produce beautiful woven goods and unique, traditional hats and jackets. Rarely are these items found in the souvenir shops located throughout the Thamel area of Kathmandu. Goods produced for trade cannot make it out of the community, hence the community has no economy. It is also difficult to make it up to the villages. The inaccessibility of mountain communities leaves many needs unmet. Education and health care are rare. Poverty and malnutrition are the norm.

It certainly is not the case the people of our mountainous regions thrive in their simple and idyllic lives. It may appear this way to the casual visitor but the reality is a life in the mountains is a hard life. Crops and livestock are much harder to grow leaving empty plates or severely limited dietary options. Infant mortality rates are higher in most mountainous regions as well, owing to the inaccessibility and resultant lack of medical staff or facilities.

The people living at the top of the world in Nepal, Tibet, Peru, Africa and much of Central Asia, to name a few are keenly aware that their lives are not the same as others they have met either on the nearby trail or in an annual foray to a nearby city. They value the same things as people everywhere do: education, healthcare and the opportunity to provide a good life for their families. I have watched school age children in the high Andes walk many miles, in winter to attend school. Often as I walked the same path as they, I would be asked if I could spare a pencil or some paper as they needed it for their studies. I have witnessed this same dogged determination to become educated in the blistering heat of the labyrinth of Mexican canyons we refer to by a single name, Copper Canyon and the cold winter chill at the top of the world in Nepal.

The Mountain Fund works in the world's mountainous regions to alleviate poverty, lack of health care and worsening environmental problems. Mountain Fund member agencies protect porter's rights, operate health clinics, protect children, advance sustainable travel and do much more humanitarian work around the world. Learn more by visiting The Mountain Fund's website at www.mountainfund.org

A Himalayan Children's Story

2007-04-10T12:10:00.000-06:00

New Book Benefits Grassroots Projects:

Clear Sky, Red Earth: A Himalayan Story, by Sienna Craig, tells a story of life in Dolpo through the eyes of Namsel, a young girl who lived in Dolpo several centuries ago, and who grows up to be a great painter.

Tenzin Norbu, the artist whose paintings illustrate this book, comes from a long lineage of Dolpo painters. He is known for his illustrations in other children's books including Himalaya and Secret of the Snow Leopard.

A portion of the sale of this book goes to support grassroots development projects in the Himalaya.

What is the Value of Medical Training?

2007-04-10T12:07:00.000-06:00

Support Young Medical Student in Nepal:
January 2006

Dear Colleague and Friend,

How much is a medical education worth?

Is 'worth' measured in earning power, personal satisfaction, or the ability to help others? I would like to suggest that for some people the value of a medical education can be measured in very concrete terms: infant mortality rates, growth and development percentages, and even cultural survival.

I recently had the chance to see firsthand what it is like for people to struggle to provide the most basic needs for their families, and to attempt to do so without access to skilled health care. I saw that there are ways to make a difference, a real difference, in the lives of the people I met. I am sharing this story with you in the hope that you can see it, too.

For several months this past year I had the opportunity to travel and work in the Himalayan region of Nepal. We are all familiar with the awe inspiring beauty of these great mountains, but did you know that Nepal is one of the very poorest countries in the world? Per capita income there is less than $300.00/year and continuing political unrest has added enormous strain to an already precarious social structure.

I was fortunate to meet a small group of very committed people who are working in a remote, ethnically isolated area of Nepal to improve the healthcare situation there. Karing for Kids (KFK) is a nonprofit charitable organization founded by a group of mountaineers to honor the memory of Anatoli Boukreev, an elite climber lost in an avalanche. A small clinic was established in the northeastern district of Rasuwa and the primary focus began as supporting maternal/child health.

The people of this border region of Nepal are ethnic Tamang, closely related to Buddhist Tibetans. Nepal is officially Hindu and a de facto caste system that favors Brahmins is in place, complicating matters further for the ethnic minority groups. One of KFK's goals is to provide education opportunities for local people so that effective, committed and compatible health programs can be sustained there by the Tamangs themselves.

Meet Phurbu, an amazing young man from the Tamang village of Chilime with the dream to become a doctor. He has successfully finished college in Kathmandu. He took entrance exams for medical school and achieved a high score, but scholarships in Nepal are scarce and rarely awarded to minority applicants. KFK would like to continue to support Phurbu so he can earn his MD, but the financial burden is significant.

I was lucky to spend time with Phurbu, with the KFK organization and with the wonderful people of this region. I had the opportunity to see first hand what it was like for people to be living on the edge: an infant dying of malnutrition, a young girl with end stage gangrene for lack of proper diagnosis, child after child sick with intestinal parasites. I know the difference that a doctor, a native of the community would make in the health and well being of the 7,000 people served by the clinic.

For the Tamang people who visit the KFK clinic the value of a medical education is immeasurable. Please support the effort to assist Phurbu through his medical education I invite you to consider giving a donation to Karing for Kids. To learn more please visit www.karingforkids.org or contact me at the address below.

Thank you for your consideration,

Laura Tashjian
lauraleetashjian@yahoo.com

Please donate to the "Phurbu Education Fund" via the Mountain Fund's donation page or by clicking on Phurbu's photo above. Please write "Phurbu" in the comments. Thank you.

MicroFinance Programs Keep Growing With Your Support

2007-04-10T12:01:00.000-06:00

Letter from Shantidhara:

Shantidhara operates a children's library and a dormitory for poor children in the Visakhapatnam district of India who otherwise wouldn't be able to attend school. Presently 12 children live at the dormitory, receive meals and help with their homework, and attend the local schools. Shantidhara hopes to add 10 more children to the hostel and start a women's microfinance program for the families they serve.

Mountain Fund wants to help Shantidhara start a microfinance program much like, Aynikuy, the micro-lending program we are supporting in Peru. [See the December 2005 newsletter for the story--archived at www.mountainfund.org]. Below is a letter to Molly Loomis, Mountain Fund staff, from A.M. Jojayya, president of Shantidhara.

Dear Molly Loomis,

One of the child in Shantidhara Children hostel lost his mother. She committed suicide by consuming pesticide. The family was having disputes since one year and it seemed the poor woman lost her patience because of the harassment of her in-laws and committed suicide. I took boy to his village, was there till her final rituals completed. She was the victim of harassment.

Thank you for your concern and initiation of focusing on Shantidhara and its Mahila Mandals (woman Associations).

As it was mentioned in the website our women initiated small savings which they deposit in their woman association account in the village post offices very regularly every month. Though they are saving at their best, the amounts are so tiny to take any micro enterprise. So if you kindly focus on this and raise the fund, this amount together with their monthly savings will be useful for them to initiate small businesses such as vegetable vending, Milk and curd vending, Basket making, leaf plate making etc., so that they can earn the money which will supplement their other aspects of life like their children education and health etc.

Hope you understand me and do needful. In any case if anyone needs any other information about Shantidhara and its activities particularly with regard to Women associations, please do not hesitate to ask me and I will immediately submit it to you.

Thank you once again on behalf of the target women and I wish you very success...

With best wishes.

Sincerely,

A.M. Jojayya
President Shantidhara

website: http://www.shantidhara.org, Email: shantidhara@yahoo.com

Facilitating Change From Within - The Mountain Fund

2007-04-10T11:52:00.000-06:00

The Voice of People Who Care About Mountain Communities and Their Environments:

The Mountain Fund is a new nonprofit with an innovative approach to alleviating the extreme poverty that is prevalent in the mountainous areas of the world. The Mountain Fund knows that humanitarian crises cannot be solved in isolation. A holistic approach is taken addressing both the root causes of extreme poverty and its myriad devastating effects on mountain communities and environments. Small grassroots organizations have banned together to form The Mountain Fund.
In mountain communities across the globe, The Mountain Fund improves lives by mobilizing the caring power of their communities. More than fundraisers, The Mountain Fund is a partner in change, working with a broad range of people, organizations and government agencies to identify and resolve pressing community and environmental issues in mountainous regions.

To achieve measurable, lasting change, The Mountain Fund identifies and builds on community strengths and assets, helps individuals and groups within specific communities find ways to contribute their time and talents, supports direct-service programs and community-change efforts, and advocate for public policy changes.

Because of the unique conditions in diverse mountain communities, the issues The Mountain Fund addresses are determined locally. Challenges ranging from basic health care, fair treatment of porters, education of impoverished children and protection of the mountain environment are on the agenda for The Mountain Fund. Depending on the issue and how the community chooses to address it, The Mountain Fund works with local governments, community groups, other nonprofits or NGO's and dedicated individuals.

Although priorities for Mountain Fund action are set locally, common themes include:

• Healthcare for children and families.
• Human rights, particularly for women and other marginalized groups.
• Promoting self-sufficiency, education, language skills, and fair labor practices.
• Volunteer programs, sustainable travel and cultural exchange.
• Building vital mountain communities and environments in the poorest places on earth.

Here is just a small sample of 2005 successes:

PUBLIC HEALTH. -Karing for Kids Mother and Child Clinic in Nepal. Raised almost $12,000 through fundraising in the U.S. and organized a week long training for traditional birth attendants- the first training of its kind in the Tamang villages the clinic serves. -Facilitated the startup of a village committee at Thulo Syabru with the goal of creating a health clinic for that community in 2006. -Partnered with Engineers Without Borders and conducted a site study with their representatives at three Tamang villages who are without clean water or toilets.

PORTERS' RIGHTS -International Mountain Explorers Connection opened two new locations for porter clothing banks, one in Pokhara near Annapurna and another near the Langtang trek trailhead. -Donated $1000 to International Porter Protection Group toward the cost of a solar electrical system for the porters hut and rescue post at Machermo in Nepal. -Obtained $3600 grant to study the possibility of a porter program in Pakistan.

ORGANIZATIONAL ASSISTANCE. -Helped Kelly Walters form Himalayan Outreach Project-Nepal and assisted with fundraising, finding supplies and recruiting volunteers. -Started and funded a micro-finance program in Peru for street vendors. -Hosting and organizing a charity trek in July in Peru to raise the money needed to open a much needed porter assistance project through IMEC in Cusco.

EDUCATION/PROMOTION -Mountain Fund and Anatoli Boukreev Fund organized and hosted Alexander Ruchkin's appearance at Harvard Mountaineering Club, American Alpine Club and Neptune Mountaineering. This is in keeping with the Boukreev Fund's mission to promote interaction between the US climbing community and that of the former Soviet Union. -Education of the public about the issues affecting mountain communities and the organizations working on those issues at events like the Outdoor Retailer Show, Ouray Ice Fest, American Alpine Club meeting and Taos Mountain Film Fest and other venues. -Our newsletter and website provide further education and awareness on the work of our partners. Thousands of individuals have been reached through our promotion and marketing.

Most importantly the 32 organizations that we support have come to the aid of thousands of the most impoverished people around the world. A couple of examples: 7000 individuals have been served by Karing for Kids Mother and Child Health Clinic. 1,788 porters were served by the Kilimanjaro Porter Assistance Project (a program of International Mountain Explorers Connection) alone. Hard numbers are difficult to acquire for the number of people helped by all of our programs. The Mountain Fund is developing methods and standards to record good data on the effectiveness of these projects.

The Mountain Fund is a unique opportunity for those who love the mountains, mountain communities and mountain environments to give something back.

This is who we are, this is what we do.

Mountain Fund Supports Machermo Porter Shelter and Rescue Post

2007-04-10T11:48:00.000-06:00

The Mountain Fund has donated $1000 towards the completion of the solar electrical system for the Machermo Porter Shelter. More funding is needed to complete the project. Read on to see why you should consider contributing to this project.
Another eventful season has come to a close and we are now poised to move into the new facility built by Community Action Nepal (CAN). We will have the hybrid wind and solar electrical system and plumbing in place for next season, meaning porters and doctors can move in!

Apart from the locally quarried stone, the building material was helicoptered to Namche under the watchful eye of Namgyal and then delivered by a two-day porter carry to Machermo.

We are now working on the management agreement between all the parties involved in the project (KBZ, CAN, National Park, IPPG) and look forward to an official opening in 2006.

This season, the post was staffed first by Dr Emma and Nick Mason (UK), then by Chhewang on his own, until Toby Savage (physician's assistant - USA) and Dr Andrew Booker (Australia) completed the season. The extracts below are from their reports. Over 150 sick or injured people were seen, some of them whose lives were saved. Many people came to the lectures and bought patches, T-shirts, books, or donated money.

Special thanks to all who donated money, especially our friends at the Himalayan Trust, the schools and sponsors. There is now a sign at Machermo listing our supporters, and which will be updated annually. Thanks also to those whose time and effort moved the project on, in particular Namgyal Sherpa, Mahesh and Gobhinda of CAN, Ian Wall, the volunteer doctors and paramedics, and last but not least Chhewang Sherpa who keeps the wheels oiled and successfully ran the post for a week on his own this season!

Jim Duff, International Coordinator

EXTRACTS FROM DR NICK AND EMMA MASON'S REPORT

“It was impossible to know what would come through the door and the conditions seen ranged from the predictable acute mountain sickness, travelers’ diarrhea, coughs, sore throats and colds, to rip roaring lobar pneumonias; pyomyositis and parotitis.

After lunch we would tour the lodges and campsites in the village to advertise the presence of the rescue post and the afternoon talks on altitude illness. Several hundred people turned up at the talks. Education is a central part of the work and is crucial to reducing the incidence of altitude related problems in the region. Once the new building is finished and with so many porters under one roof we will be able to provide mountain safety education to the porters including Altitude Illness, hypothermia and frostbite.

We treated a number of patients with severe high altitude pulmonary oedema who required helicopter evacuation. It was quite a challenge, for somebody used to the endless supplies of piped oxygen on his university hospital intensive care unit, to juggle the limited supplies of bottled oxygen, the short battery life of the oxygen concentrator and time in the Portable Altitude Chamber. Especially in patients whose oxygen saturation stubbornly refused to climb out of the mid-40s! (note: normal at sea level is 98-100, ed).

Gopal, a porter, was abandoned by his trekking group when he fell ill at Gokyo after carrying a load from Namche to re-supply a Swiss group that had trekked in via the less direct and more technical Renjo La. We do not know how and why he was left to walk back down from Gokyo on his own having passed the previous night struggling to breathe*. He was found semi-conscious at the side of the trail by a group of British trekkers. Their Sherpa guide Furbar saved Gopal’s life by carrying him several kilometers to our Rescue Post on his back. When he got to us, Gopal was very sick with high altitude pulmonary oedema complicated by cerebral oedema and on a couple of occasions during the night we thought he might die as he failed to respond to treatment... fortunately trekkers’ donations paid for a helicopter rescue to Khunde Hospital the following morning where Gopal recovered rapidly.

(Due to the expense it is uncommon for porters to be helicoptered out and it is down to the generosity of all those trekkers at Machermo that night, especially the Brits, who donated the money to make Gopal's rescue possible, ed) (*Frequently sick porters are paid off by the Nepalese leader or sirdar without the trekkers knowing. ed)

What is Community Tourism?

2007-04-10T11:36:00.000-06:00

Jamaica’s Example:

Community tourism is socially sustainable tourism, which is initiated and almost always operated exclusively by local people. Shared leadership emphasizing community well-being over individual profit balances power within communities, and fosters cultural preservation and pride, conservation, and responsible stewardship of the land.

Communities at Work:

Communities that embrace sustainable tourism as a tool for economic development hold the key to their futures. Every citizen is a potential partner to be trained in small business management, environmental awareness, product development and marketing. In addition to this, local people learn the true value of their communities' most valuable assets - their culture, heritage, cuisine and lifestyle. This, in turn, assists them in preserving their culture while increasing their income and employment opportunities.

Community Tourism in Jamaica:

Community Tourism as a means of development brings tourism into the context where it does not act as an exploiter of resources but as a motivation to sustain the environment as well as cultural authenticity. It changes the scope of tourism so that it's no longer characterized by a subservient host-visitor relationship, but as a tool to build cross-cultural bonds, mutual respect and understanding. Here in Jamaica, Community Tourism shifts the traditional tourism mindset into an avenue where communities across the country become empowered in tapping into the international tourism market, opening up new niches for Jamaica as a destination, most notably travelers interested in nature, culture, eco- and adventure travel. It is sustainable and seeks to build on the natural and cultural 'capital' of a specific area.

Countrystyle Community Tourism Network:

Community tourism has been advocated for over thirty years, through the pioneering efforts of the Countrystyle Community Tourism Network team headed by Diana McIntyre-Pike & family and her partner Barry Bonitto who have paved the way for others and received the support of the International Institute for Peace through Tourism, the Sustainable Communities Foundation through Tourism and Desmond Henry, former Jamaica Director of Tourism.

Countrystyle Community Tourism Network is one of Jamaica's best on-island groups of hospitality professionals. They are Jamaica and the wider Caribbean's pioneers in Community Tourism, bringing visitors and citizens closer together. An example of a community tourism vacation is where in one week, a visitor can visit communities to enjoy and learn about their lifestyle, foods, and community-based programs and projects. Schools, churches, youth centers, and hospitals are all examples of income earners from community vacations.

Through the Unique Jamaica Responsible Tourism and Product Network, visitors are encouraged to 'pick a project' and 'adopt a village' while on vacation. A traveler's philanthropy program results in long lasting relationships between visitors and communities and encourages a high rate of repeat business. This interactivity within our global village can improve people's quality of life around the world, and the travel and tourism industry can help to build these linkages and strong communities.

Visit the Mountain Fund’s bookshelf at Powell’s bookstore online, which has an excellent book about Dr. Paul Farmer and Jamaica’s healthcare titled “Mountains Beyond Mountains” by Tracy Kidder.

Your Cause-related Marketing Budget

2007-04-10T11:30:00.000-06:00

Why The Mountain Fund is your best buy:

With the Outdoor Retailer Show coming up this week we thought we should do a follow up to last issue's article called "Building a better playground." In that article, we highlighted the response by consumers to cause-related marketing as reported in a collection of studies.

The results were:
8 in 10 Americans say corporate support of causes wins their trust in that company.
86% of Americans are likely to switch brand allegiance to one associated with a charitable cause.
72% of Americans prefer working for a company that supports charities.

Clearly, cause-related marketing and partnerships with socially responsible causes adds value to your products. Below, we will demonstrate why The Mountain Fund represents the best option for your cause-related marketing dollars. When compared to the other leading charities supported by the Outdoor Industry, The Mountain Fund reaches a far more diverse consumer market with a globally reaching cause.

First, the case for The Mountain Fund:

Demographic reach covers entire outdoor industry, including climbers, hikers, backpackers and international travelers.
Geographic reach includes several domestic programs and nearly 30 programs in 11 countries.
Topic/Cause appeal: the U.N. Millennium Development Goals, women's equality, healthcare, children and at- risk youth, education, environmental and cultural preservation, wildlife, human rights, responsible tourism, micro-finance, outdoor gear recycling and outdoor search and rescue support.
The other leading charitable causes supported primarily by the Outdoor Industry:

Demographic: Narrow subset of the Outdoor Industry; climbers only.
Geographic: U.S. interest only
Topic/Cause: Issues commonly of relevance to climbers only; even then, only certain narrow issues.

So, for you companies reading this at O.R., go have a word with your marketing department. If you want to reach more people, associate with more causes and expand your reach globally, The Mountain Fund can make your marketing dollars work harder for you.

Heart & Soul: What we are doing & why you should care

2007-04-10T11:25:00.000-06:00

One and a half years ago we started The Mountain Fund with the goal of becoming the charity that represents the heart and soul of the Outdoor Industry around the world. We had taken a long hard look at the situation and found that, on an international scale, no one was stepping up to the plate and representing outdoor sports like climbing, hiking and trekking in a way that made clear that the industry had heart and soul.

Today, there is a voice for people and companies that thrive on outdoor sports and care about how the industry looks to the people that live in the mountainous regions we enjoy so much. That voice is The Mountain Fund.

In 2006, The Mountain Fund gave out over $30,000 in grants and in-kind services to nearly 30 programs operating in 10 countries around the world. We did this with two part time staff and a total budget of just over $40,000. We also took nearly a dozen volunteers to mountain regions to help work at clinics, raise funds for a micro-finance program and assist in a project to help a small rural school.

In 2007, we will do much, much more:

Start the Climbers' Alert Network to help families of climbers and adventure travellers make it through hard times.
Our health clinics in Nepal will provide care to over 9,000 people.
Our micro-finance program in Peru will enable dozens of families to start and sustain a business.
Our partnership with CutandPaste web labs will provide job training for promising young people in Peru.
Our volunteer center in Kathmandu will bring hundreds of volunteers together with the groups that need them.
Our volunteer trips will bring healthcare and assistance to the most remote villages in Nepal and Peru.
Our support of women's programs will provide opportunity to dozens of women.
Our support of youth programs will open doors for hundreds of at-risk youth.
Our backpack and sleeping bag recycle programs will put tons of gear back to good use.
Our support of environmental programs will help our planet to survive and sustain us all.

We are The Mountain Fund. We are your humanitarian voice around the world. We appreciate your support. Together we can, and will, go further.

Thank you!

ClimbHigh Foundation needs sleeping bags!

2007-04-10T11:20:00.000-06:00

The ClimbHigh Program empowers women of Uganda:

The ClimbHigh Foundation is dedicated to teaching women in developing nations the skills that will enable them to benefit from climbing and trekking-related tourism. We focus our work in geographic areas where women have subordinate social status, and as a result have little or no access to education, healthcare or jobs.

Our programs enable these women to work as trekking guides and porters in their local mountains and national parks so that they can maintain an adequate, sustainable living wage and can make meaningful, long-term improvements to their quality of life. Our goal is not only to help them achieve financial independence, but also to provide a catalyst for social change in their communities.

Women that ClimbHigh has trained and helped to find jobs for need equipment to do their jobs. We are in desperate need of sleeping bags, preferably synthetic insulated ones. The women of ClimbHigh need clean sleeping bags in good condition so they can go to work in the mountains.

Please send sleeping bags to
The Mountain Fund
139 Madison NE
Albuquerque
NM
87108

Empowering the Women of Nepal - Women's Outdoor Programs

2007-04-10T11:14:00.000-06:00

Empowering the Women of Nepal recently conducted rock climbing training near its center in Pokhara. A total of 18 participants were involved.

Empowering the Women of Nepal (EWN) and 3 Sisters Adventure Trekking work in partnership to promote and empower women through adventure tourism. Together they combine practical skill-based training programs with gainful employment opportunities, specifically focused in the Trekking Industry. Responding to the gross inequality of women in Nepal, EWN offers unprecedented opportunities for Nepali women to improve their quality of life.

In January, a new class began to train Nepali women to work in the trekking and outdoor industry. 29 women from 11 districts in Nepal attended the program.

Programs such as Empowering the Women of Nepal and The ClimbHigh Foundation (see next article) really need and deserve the support from all of us in the Outdoor Industry, as well as anyone who cares about the future of countries like Nepal and Uganda.

In much of the developing world, women are considered chattal. One-half of the human resources are prohibited from obtaining an education, holding a job outside the home and making a contribution to society. Programs like EWN and ClimbHigh provide hope and opportunity. Please support them. Donate to women's programs today at Mountain Fund today.

Himalaya House Needs Your Help

2007-04-10T11:07:00.000-06:00

Home to girls rescued from servitude in Pokhara, Nepal -

Himalaya House was founded in 2003 with the purpose of creating a safe haven for disadvantaged and abandoned girls in Nepal. Girls who have spent their lifetimes in distress are now given hope for the first time, along with a second chance at the world like never before. At the gateway to the Annapurna Mountain Range, Himalaya House is home to up-to-15 girls, a Nepali housemother and visiting foreign volunteers.

In the ongoing struggle for survival of the family, girls as young as 5 or 6 are commonly bonded into sweatshop labor or domestic servitude. In exchange for their daughters, parents are promised money, support of their domestic affairs and even education and fair treatment for their children. Instead, these girls are forced to work in extremely poor environments and imprisoned in inhumane conditions. Many suffer from harassment, abuse and sexual violence. Even worse than forced labor, but for the promise of more money, family members often kidnap or bond their own kin into the sex trade. Giving them a new chance at life means giving much more than just a safe haven, beyond the affection and protection of their new family.

Some facts: Each year more than 10,000 girls between the ages of 10-18 are trafficked into the sex trade, often sold by their parents or a relative. The trafficking of young girls is on the rise. They are trafficked for domestic work, forced beggary, marriage, carpet weaving and into the sex trade. Since the beginning of the Maoist conflicts in 1996, many families are fleeing their village homes. Because of this, there is a dramatic increase in the number of girls displaced in the city areas now involved in exploitive labor sectors.

Himalaya House is devoted to creating meaningful lives and second chances for disadvantaged girls in Nepal. Only with your support are we able to continue to provide this hope. For $60 a month you can provide a home, food, clothing and an education for a young Nepali that needs your support to succeed. That's only $2.00 a day to help a young woman start a new life. Skip one trip to the espresso bar and give a girl a home and education, won't you? Himalaya House is full to capacity with no funds to feed and educate these girls.

Volunteer opportunities at home and in Nepal are available for the motivated and dedicated.

Recycle, Reuse and Pass on the Passion

2007-04-10T10:25:00.000-06:00

In the introduction to this issue of our newsletter, we told you about our partnership with Osprey Packs to "Pass on the Passion". Under the Osprey program, you can get a 10% rebate on a brand new Osprey pack by sending your old (clean and usable) pack to The Mountain Fund. We'll get your old pack back into service for someone who needs it at home or abroad. You'll also be keeping your old pack out of a landfill and help the planet at the same time.

We also told you about the need for the ClimbHigh women to have sleeping bags in this issue. Now that ClimbHigh has made the effort to blaze the trail and find employment and training for these Ugandan women, we need to help outfit them for the task. As was the case with your pack, you are keeping your old sleeping bag out of the landfill and helping our planet too.

Building on the two ideas above, The Mountain Fund has reserved the URL's for www.Gear4Good.org and www.Gear4Good.com. With help from our industry partners, we aim to offer up the opportunity to have all of your used outdoor gear wind up supporting good causes and getting a second life with people who really need it.

In the U.S., there are dozens of at-risk youth outdoor programs who can use packs, sleeping bags, boots, outerwear, hats and gloves. Porter programs in Nepal, Peru and Tanzania always need good sturdy gear. Search and rescue teams in developing countries need the same.

Turn your out-of-date apparel into something good - yes, send us that green and pink Gore-tex jacket you wore in the '80s along with that screaming yellow Colorado suit you used to ice climb in. Last year's hot trail running shoes are much needed by porters, as well as those way out-of-date plastic boots you are still climbing in.

The Mountain Fund will find second homes for your used gear, and if we can't, we'll list it on our E-bay charity auction site and turn it into cash to support all of our programs.

We are actively seeking industry partners to help us launch a full-scale program to recycle the tons of used outdoor gear that is going to landfills instead of to good causes. If your company would like to pioneer this project with us. Please contact mtnfund@mountainfund.org

Mountain Fund Volunteer Visitor Center

2006-08-30T18:28:00.000-06:00

Every year thousands of tourists come to Nepal to climb these and other peaks or to trek the Annapurna Circuit, Everest base camp trek, the Langtang trek or one of the more remote treks in Nepal.

Many tourists do not come with the intention of volunteering their time but find themselves moved and compelled to volunteer once they see the country and meet the people of Nepal.

Nepal is the poorest country in SE Aisa.

Average Income is $200 per year
GDP per capita is $1500 per year
1/3 of Nepal is without clean water
85% have no access to health care
80% of Nepalis are farmers
Life expectancy in Nepal is 60
½ of the population is illiterate (higher rates for women)
47% of the population is unemployed

Volunteering is a cost-effective way of providing a range of social and welfareservices, but it is not cost-free. In order to flourish, volunteerism requires aneffective infrastructure, both at the national and local level, to help mobilize supportand match the volunteers to appropriate host organizations and tasks. Source: Volunteerism in Nepal – 2001 UN Report

Volunteers to Nepal

Contribute nearly 5% to the GDP of the country
Volunteering helps in social integration, particularly for those who are excluded or marginalized.

I am constantly asked on the trail, “What can I do, how do I volunteer to help here in Nepal?” People come to Nepal to trek but find they have a week left at the end of the trek and now, having seen this place, they feel they must do something before leaving.

To answer this question for many potential volunteers The Mountain Fund Volunteer Information Center is now under construction is in a very high traffic location near tourist center of Kathmandu. The center will be staffed daily by Mountain Fund staff who will be able to direct volunteers to one of the thirteen Nepali organizations we work with. We will have daily presentations by local nonprofit partners on volunteer opportunities in Nepal and provide Internet access for volunteers and supporters. We'll also have daily showings of the BBC documentary Carrying the Burden, an important film on porters.

As you can see in the artist rendering of the inside, the walls are a photo gallery of all the places and projects The Mountain Fund and our in-country partners are working. We'll also have brochures from all 13 in-country projects.

One of the truly remarkable features of The Mountain Fund Volunteer Visitor Center is vending service that will run by a former porter, Kul Bahadur. Kul's Coffee and Tea service is destined to become the Starbucks of Kathmandu. Kul's is a remarkable story of survival, loss and caring assistance. Kul became quite ill at 18,000ft while working as a porter in the Everest region. He was sent down alone and later found in a state of collapse and brought to the Pheriche Aid Post. He spent nine days in a coma, and had both feet partially amputated due to frostbite. As a result of this amputation, he is unable to return to portering.

With the generous support of several individuals and organizations like IMEC, Kul was able to pay off his medical bills. Additionally, was able to move his wife and daughters to Kathmandu, thus reuniting his family He had been unable to trek home to visit with them as a result of his amputation.

Kul's Coffee and Tea is the final step toward regaining the ability to work and support his family. Since he was no longer able to work as a porter Kul's ambition has been to save money and start his own small business to pay for his daughters education and support he and his wife. The Mountain Fund is creating that opportunity for Kul by setting him up in the coffee and tea vending business at our Visitor Center. We'll be helping Kul manage his money, learn basic bookkeeping and business principles so that he will be able to own and operate his own business.

If you'd like to help us and support the Volunteer Visitor Information Center and at the same time help Kul realize his dreams please visit our main website at www.mountainfund.org to make a donation.

To learn more about Kul, visit IMEC at http://www.hec.org/assisting/kulbahadur.htm

Mountain Fund Visits Taos Solar Fest

2006-06-27T14:01:00.000-06:00

The Mountain Fund joined the Solar Village at the Taos Solar Fest this past weekend (6/24-6/25). Here is a photo of the Mountain Fund at work educating the masses, one person at a time, on issues affecting mountain peoples and their environments. We received a great response and a lot of enthusiasm for the work of the Mountain Fund and its programs.

The Taos Solar Fest is a great music and education event and if you didn't make it this year you should certainly plan to go next year. In addition to great performances by artists such as Spearhead, Ani Difranco, Peter Rowan, Steel Pulse and others there are booths with information and volunteers happy to tell you about solar, environmental, and humanitarian causes.

One last photo that I have to share with you is of a
bicycle locked up outside of the festival. I titled this photo Taos Bicycle: Old West Meets New West.

Economic Possibilities Part 2

2006-06-02T15:40:00.000-06:00

Economic Possibilities for Our Times, by Jeffery D. Sachs
Jeff Sachs' groundbreaking book asserts that extreme poverty can be eliminated from the planet by the year 2015. In this, the second part of our three- part series we will discuss the specific goals of the Millennium Development Goals including examination of what we in the US agreed to do, and what we are doing.
The Millennium Development GoalsThe Global Compact to End Poverty

Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

Achieve universal primary education

Promote gender equality and empower women

Reduce child mortality

Improve maternal health

Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

Ensure environmental sustainability

Develop a global partnership for development

To see the full MDGs click here.
For us in what Sachs' calls a "high-income" country, these needs are already 100 percent fulfilled even for the relatively poor. To meet these needs for the world's poor will require a decade or more of investment. But, let's pause there for a moment and get a handle on what sort of investment is required. The total amount needed to meet all eight goals sounds like a staggering number, $72 billion per year, until it is put into context. There are roughly 1.1 billion people living in extreme poverty, the type of poverty that kills. Each of those 1.1 billion people however, requires the modest sum of roughly $65.00 per year in aid for the MDGs to be realized. Spending $65 per person, per year doesn't seem like too large an investment to make in our fellow humans.
Do we have the resources to afford the MDGs? Yes, without question. Again the small and personal numbers help to keep a real perspective on the issue. Consider five developing countries - Bangladesh, Cambodia, Ghana, Tanzania and Uganda. In order to scale up infrastructure and social services by the year 2015 to address the needs of those nations will require about $100 per person per year from 2005 to 2015. The rich world, the one we live in has an annual per capita income of nearly $27,000 per person plus government revenues of an additional $7000 per person per year for a total of $34, 000 per person per year. An investment of $100 is a small sum. For the poorest countries however, $100 per capita is a very large sum, equal to the income per capita of Ethiopia in 2001.
Has something on this scale been attempted before?Absolutely. At the end of WWII the Marshall Plan was implemented to re-build war devastated Europe. The United States, from 1948 through 1952 contributed more than 1% of our gross domestic product to support the Marshall Plan. That's around ten times the effort we are currently making toward the MDGs as a share of our GNP. Today we are giving 0.15 percent of GNP toward the MDGs. We pledged to give 0.7 percent and are short of our pledge by 0.55 percent of GNP. Our GNP rises about 1.9% per year, meaning that the amount we have pledged, but not contributed is less than one third of the annual increase in our GNP. Think of it this way, if the US were on track to reach the level of $40,000 per capita disposable income by January 1, 2010, making our promised contribution would delay that until May 1, 2010 or a third of a year. This four month lag would mean that a billion people would be given an economic future of hope, health and improvement rather than a downward spiral of disease, despair and decline. I think we could stand the four month wait, don't you?
Another approach to the math.In 2000 the IRS issued a report on the richest taxpayers. The top four hundred tax payers had a combined income of $69 billion dollars or roughly $174 million each. The income of just these 400 taxpayers exceeds the combined incomes of Botswana, Nigeria, Senegal and Uganda which is $57 million dollars. Consider the most recent three tax cuts we have been granted and the impact of those cuts which amounted to $220 billion dollars per year. The tax savings of the households above $500,000 per year in income amount to about $50 billion per year, enough to fund our share of the MDG needs.
Why we can't wait for the top 400 taxpayers.The preceding paragraph may have influenced you to believe that if "they", the richest people in our country, would just pay their fair share all would be well. We get too easily trapped in the idea that "they" is someone, but not us. The truth is that if you and I don't take action, no one is going to. Waiting for the richest four hundred people to fork over $50 billion could be a long, long wait. Small amounts from people like you and I can make a huge difference.
I recently read, for instance, that their are 1.6 million people who climb in North America alone. Sounds like an exaggeration but try to get a route on the Flatirons on a weekend and you'll start to believe it. I took a look at the budgets for the 32 programs that The Mountain Fund operates and determined that if every climber each sent us just twenty- five cents we could meet all of our goals for program support here at The Mountain Fund. Just a quarter each and 32 programs would be solid for one more year. So, you see what each of us can easily afford to do. I know there have been a lot of numbers in this article and I urge you to go back over these and allow them to fully sink in. Once you do, I think you will agree that the end of poverty is firmly within our grasp.
Get a copy of The End of Poverty at our online bookstore here . Join in this discussion at The Mountain Fund Blog here.
(This article consists of excerpts and commentary on writings from both The End of Poverty and from the December/January issue of Time Magazine.)

The End of Poverty

2006-02-26T16:41:00.000-07:00

The End of Poverty

Economic Possibilities For Our Times, by Jeffery D. Sachs.

Jeff Sachs' groundbreaking book asserts that extreme poverty can be eliminated from the planet by the year 2015. In this, the first part of a three part series in which we will examine and discuss Sachs' claims, we will begin our search for the truth by examining what extreme poverty is and why some countries just can’t seem to escape the poverty trap.

Sach’s book separates fact from fiction about the causes and cures. For many of us the idea that poverty is a state that has always been with us and will always be with us is such a pervasively accepted truth, we do little to seriously attack the problem. Sachs shows us that we are surrounded in a fog of myth, half-truth and in some cases, outright misrepresentation. For example, former US Secretary Paul O’Neill said, “We’ve spent trillions of dollars on these problems and we have damn near nothing to show for it.” His remarks were specifically about aid for Africa. President Bush said in 2004 that as “...the greatest power on the face of the earth, we have an obligation to help the spread of freedom. We have an obligation to feed the hungry.” US aid to farmers in poor countries to help them grow more food runs at about $200 million per year, or less then $1.00 per person per year for the hundreds of millions of people living in subsistence farming households.

Could it be that the investment we make, as large as $200 million sounds, until you compare that number to the real wealth of our country, is simply too small to make any difference? Worse still, do we know that what we are giving is too small to make any difference? Do we act as if it is enough then lament the outcomes, the damn near nothing to show for it sentiment? I’ll save you reading that part of the book and answer that yes, we know we aren’t giving enough to produce any real results, we absolutely know it. Let’s compare our spending policies for military and poverty for a moment. This year the US will spend nearly $500 billion (with a B) on the military. We will spend one-thirtieth of that or $16 billion, to address the plight of the poorest of the poor.

The poorest of the poor are living in countries whose societies are destabilized by extreme poverty, the types of societies that may become the breeding grounds for tomorrow’s terrorists. Can we hope to achieve lasting peace in the world when only 15¢ on every $100 dollars of our national income is spent to eliminate poverty around the planet? It’s a rhetorical question really and it gets worse. Our share devoted to help the poor has been in decline for decades and is a tiny fraction of what the US has repeatedly promised, and repeatedly failed to give.

As I sometimes do, I am getting ahead of things though. Let’s get back to defining the extreme poor before we move on in parts two and three to looking at the solutions in more detail. Nearly half the 6 billion people in the world are poor. That fact shocked me so much I had to re-read it a few times before I could really grasp the implications of it. As a matter of definition there are three degrees of poverty: extreme (or absolute) poverty, moderate poverty and relative poverty. Extreme poverty, defined by the World Bank as getting by on an income of less than $1 a day, means that households cannot meet basic needs for survival. They are chronically hungry, unable to get healthcare, lack safe drinking water and sanitation, cannot afford education for their children and perhaps lack rudimentary shelter – a roof to keep rain out of the hut – and basic articles of clothing, like shoes. Extreme poverty has been described as “the poverty that kills.”

Moderate poverty, defined as living on $1 to $2 a day, refers to conditions in which basic needs are met, but just barely. Relative poverty is defined by household income levels below a certain proportion of the national average and lacking in things that the middle class takes for granted.

Extreme poverty exists almost exclusively in the so-called developing world. The World Bank estimates there are 1.1 billion (with a B) people living in extreme poverty or about one-sixth of the world’s population. Where are these people? For the most part they live in either sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, particularly Southeast Asia or one of the world’s mountainous regions such as South America and Central Asia including much of the former Soviet Union.

Get a copy of The End of Poverty at our online bookstore here. Join in this discussion at The Mountain Fund Blog here.

(This article consists of excerpts and commentary on writings from both The End of Poverty and from the December/January issue of Time Magazine.)

What more in the name of love?

2006-02-25T17:32:00.000-07:00

What more in the name of love.

Bono and the End of Poverty.

U2 singer Bono has been actively covered in the press lately, not for his latest CD, but for his stand on world poverty. Time magazine recently named Bono one of it' s "Persons of the Year" alongside Bill and Melinda Gates. The increased giving to human aid projects around the world has even come to be known as the "Bono Effect." So what is a rocker doing digging so deeply in the causes and cures of world poverty and does he have a message that we should all listen to? In the foreword to Jeff Sachs' groundbreaking new book The End of Poverty the rock-star turned humanitarian has these things to say about global poverty:

Hunger, disease, the waste of lives that is extreme poverty is an affront to all of us.

Fifteen thousand Africans dying each and every day of preventable, treatable diseases - AIDS, malaria, TB- for lack of drugs that we take for granted. This statistic alone makes a fool of the idea that many of us hold on to very tightly: the idea of equality.

Equality is a very big idea, connfreedom freedome, but an idea that doesn't come for free. If we're serious, we have to be prepared to pay the price. Some people will say we can't afford to do it. I think we can't afford not to do it.

We can be the generation that no longer accepts that an accident of latitude determines whether a child lives or dies. We can't say our generation didn't know how to do it. We can't say our generation couldn't afford to do it. And we can't say our generation didn't have reason to do it.

Bono knows what he is talking about. He has invested himself heavily in the crusade to end extreme poverty on the planet and knows it is within our reach to do so. That sounds perhaps like a pipe dream. Few of us have taken on the task of really imagining that extreme poverty could be eliminated on the planet and within our lifetime. Many of us have come to believe that extreme poverty is a persistent fact of life that will not go away no matter how much time and money is invested in its eradication.

In the next few newsletters, we'll examine more closely what can be done about extreme poverty and discuss Jeff Sachs' claim that we have it within our grasp to eliminate it by the year 2015.