Women help support their families by weaving and selling traditional artisan goods. All photos by Kimberly Conger © CARE 2001.

Day 5: The River Market
At 8 a.m. we push off to visit a handful of communities working with handicrafts and raising small animals, which serve as both an alternate source of income and protein for families.

Rain begins hammering down as we arrive at the Chachi community of Loma Linda. Locals holding huge banana leaves over their heads to block the rain greet us at the steep river's edge and guide us through the mud, around and under houses and up a slippery ladder to their workshop, an open-air structure 10-feet off the ground.

In communities like Loma Linda, women play a new and important role in providing alternative income for their families. The women in Loma Linda use the rampira plant to weave baskets for sale. The large ones sell for $.50. It may not sound like much, but last year they sold for only $.20.

As part of the SUBIR Project, CARE has been working as a go-between with local markets and communities to negotiate better prices for these products. CARE also is soliciting the globally recognized green seal certification for these and numerous other handicraft products to sell to environmentally-conscious consumers around the world.

"With families earning a little more than $100 a year, primarily by selling wood, it means a lot to get a better price for these types of products," says Fanny Ramirez of CARE. "By creating alternative jobs, families are given economic incentives to protect their resources for long-term profits rather than short-term gain."

Women weave a variety of colorful artisan goods, including tablecloths and belts.

Carmen Lopez is a 27-year-old Chachi Indian and mother of three. Standing in the workshop, she carefully unwraps the inner lining of a rampira tree and peals off 12 half-inch wide, yard-long green strips. With the swiftness and control of a puppet master, she uses her fingers to curl over, wrap under and tie together the rampira strips. Ten minutes later, she timidly walks up to me and hands me a small basket. When dry, the baskets take on a black and tan checkered pattern.

Carmen can weave five large baskets in a day.

"My mother taught me to weave when I was a little girl, just as her mother taught her. With the extra money [from the sale of these baskets], we are able to clothe our children," she says.

"By purchasing sustainable rainforest products from indigenous communities, everyone can be part of the solution," says Jody Stallings, CARE SUBIR director.

The Corozo family raises chickens as an extra source of protein.

Tastes Like Chicken
Leaving the shelter of the workshop, we trot back through the rain and foot-deep mud puddles to the canoe. A short hop upriver, the rain turns to drizzle as we arrive at the home of 52-year-old Laural Corozo, a high-spirited Afro-Ecuadorian mother of eight. Corozo is pioneering part of the SUBIR Project, which seeks to preserve local animals by introducing new sources of protein for local residents.

Standing around the chicken coop in their backyard, two of Corozo's children join in a family call for their chickens to come eat. A few seconds later, some 20 chickens stampede toward us.

Holding a cornhusk in the palm of her hand, Corozo uses her thumb to flick seed on the ground around her mud-stained feet.

"We feed the chickens and the chickens feed my family," she says as the chickens peck up the seeds. "When you have chickens, you know you have food."

Her husband, Aquiles, who grows sugar cane, bananas, sweet peppers and onions on parts of their three acres of land, quietly nods in approval as he gently holds up a freshly laid egg.

Laural Corozo, 52, is a pioneer in the SUBIR Project.

"Until recently, river rats have been the only source of protein for these families. They taste a lot like chicken, but to help preserve local species, we wanted to offer another option," says Beto Oviedo, a Jatun Sacha animal husbandry staffer working on the SUBIR Project. "Besides chickens, other families have chosen to raise goats and pigs. CARE starts them out with a few animals and a plan that they give some offspring to other families in their community."

Besides raising her children and chickens, Corozo also earns income for her family by making handicrafts.

Paddling to Work
Every Thursday and Friday she paddles her small canoe a short distance downstream to a woman's handicraft workshop. Putting on her glasses to get a closer view for detail, she uses a small razor to carve sun and river landscape designs into dried calabazo shells that are then turned into bowls, maracas or lampshades. She says it takes her two days to carve one-half of a bowling ball-size shell that sells for $2. She has taught her 14-year-old daughter Elisa the unique trade.

Today at the workshop, Fanny Ramirez of CARE trains locals on a timesaving way to put a shine on the shells using a new generator-powered buffer.

Luis Cadena carefully transforms a piece of wood into an animal figurine.

"Be very careful when you use this machine," she says, while transforming half of a shell into a shiny bowl. "ALWAYS pay close attention to what you're doing and never take your eyes off it. The future of your fingers might depend on it."

While Ramirez continues with the training, we head across the river to the Chachi community of Guadual to visit a carpenter's shop, a 20-square foot open-air room with a dirt floor and rudimentary tin roof.

At the community's request two years ago, CARE provided a generator, a table saw and tools, then trained residents in how to use them to produce items made from cedar. The community now builds and sells dining room sets ($48), bed frames ($32) and animal figurines ($4) to a Borbón vendor, who, in turn, sells them in Quito.

"CARE helped us to develop a plan. Forty percent of the profit goes to the builder, 30 percent to the community for reforestation and education, and 30 percent covers the cost of materials," says Luis Cadena, the shop manager, raising his voice over the noise of the saw and the rain beating down on the tin roof.

SUBIR staffers Damian Villacres and Beto Oviedo work and play in harmony.

"Our goal is to put the project in the hands of community members and their families," says Jody Stallings, CARE SUBIR director. "This project has created incentives for the community to protect the forests buffering the adjacent Cotacachi-Cayapas Ecological Reserve."

At the San Miguel field house later that night, we end the day with a send-off party on the front porch. With Damian Villacres singing lead vocals and Beto Oviedo playing the guitar around the light of two candles, we hum along and make requests from the shadows.

Tomorrow we journey back to Quito.