El Salvador Archives - True Travellers Society

Community-based Hawksbill Conservation Projects in Central America

Period
The project runs from April 15th to September 15th, 2012.

Location
The project takes place in two different locations: Natural Reserve Estero Padre Ramos, Nicaragua, and Biosphere Reserve Jiquilisco Bay, El Salvador.

Background Information
We strongly believe that communities are fundamental to long-term sea turtle conservation efforts. By working closely with local community members that depend on turtles for their livelihoods, we harness their vast knowledge of these creatures and thus maximize conservation efforts. Most threats to hawksbills are related to human activities and by working with these stakeholders to actively generate socio-economic alternatives we convert former turtle “poachers” in turtle heroes, while providing direly needed economic benefits to families in need.

The volunteer program was also initiated to extend the unique opportunity to participate in our work to the public, while also moving the program towards financial sustainability. Volunteers are critical to the success of the project, serving as personnel to ensure improved conservation efforts, while also generating funding essential to local community members and the project.
Volunteer contributions also assist in building a sense of local pride and increasing awareness, demonstrating the importance and benefits of protecting hawksbills and marine resources in general. Aside from working directly with the turtles, volunteers also have opportunities to get involved in other local ecological and social issues, providing unique cultural and educational experiences for both volunteers and locals alike.
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Homidos Unidos – Volunteer El Salvador

On November 2, 1996 a group of youth from different neighborhoods came together in San Salvador, El Salvador to discuss methods and means of diminishing the violence that plagues too many of our lives and communities. Out of this meeting the unique organization, Homies Unidos was born.

We reach out to youth in both the U.S. and Latin America, providing hope and opportunities. Our programs in El Salvador include deportee assistance, education, job training, and community outreach.

Homies Unidos began our Los Angeles work in 1997. Our local office is comprised primarily of Central American and other Latino youth who have renounced the violence in their lives. Working in the Koreatown and Pico-Union areas, our members have dedicated their lives to creating alternatives to crime, drugs, and violence.

MISSION: Homies Unidos works to provide the inherent right of youth, families and their communities to pursue their dreams and achieve their full potential in a just, safe and healthy society.

For more than ten years, Homies Unidos has been a catalyst for change, working to end violence and promote peace in our communities through gang prevention, the promotion of human rights in immigrant communities, and the empowerment of youth through positive alternatives to gang involvement and destructive behavior.

We are living proof that prevention works and that peace is possible.

http://homiesunidos.org/about/history/