Help an afrodescendant Mexican community to empower their community life!

Please, we kindly ask for your help, we´ve launched this crowdfunding campaign in order to get out from poverty and marginalization we are living in, read the full story and give us a hand, collaborate and share with your friends, as much louder the shout wider impact and success we will have.

Who we are?

We are an afrodescendant communal land cooperative society belonging to Corralero Communal Land. Our community and communal land is located in the Mexican Pacific southern cost, into the municipality of Santiago Pinotepa Nacional, Oaxaca State. Our town population is around 2,500 people, being approximately 97% afrodescendants and the remaining 3% Mixtec people (see location map).

Traditionally, our main economic activity has been fishing, activity which has seen diminished in recent times, affecting our precarious incomes and our quality of life; it´s because of this that we have seen ecotourism as a feasible complement in order to keep a constant income as the same time we look after our ecosystem and allow it to rest and recover its balance, thus we´ll be able to combine fishing and tourism and make them both profitable in a sustainable way.

Young guy fishing, ©.

Beyond that, there are some adverse conditions affecting social development and having communities like the one we live in high levels of marginalization, this due to current Mexican sociopolitical condition, corruption and diversion of federal programs public funds that should serve to attend parallel problematics to ours and to develop ecotourism programs, although at the end benefits coming from public account go to a few public officials personal accounts (high level government officers) or in some cases government uses public programs to control people or with a political aim.

All aforementioned have us in entire abandonment by 3 levels of government. We have tried to access to some programs and we have never been heard, all money goes to people on top of the social scale or to fund more great tourism hotels (owned by international firms where they have shares) in places like Cancún, Huatulco or Los Cabos, and we poor people still poor and with no opportunities.

One more thing to have in mind is the lack of recognition before several national institutions, as we the Mexican black people (afrodescendants or afromexicans) have no complete social inclusion in country issues, in fact there is a Committee for the Development of Indigenous People but there is not a Committee for Development of Black People, we just don´t exist.

Ultimately, and which has come to aggravate our situation, there are recent natural disasters that have hit great part of the national territory, constant earthquakes with magnitude higher than 4 degrees, hurricanes and tropical storms that strike the Pacific Ocean. We had some precarious infrastructure to provide lodging which has been damaged with recent natural events.

What do we need?

Focusing on ecotourism as a feasible choice in order to achieve an integral development for our community is that we ask for help through abroad crowdfunding platforms like this one, aiming to reach our environmental goals, with the natural, social and economic implications that tourism activity entails. With your help we will reach what we want, to be a local place managed by our same organized community aiming to be sustainable.

Camping in Corralero, ©.

Because the aforementioned, is that we need certain amount of economical support to materialize the designed project, a participatory project issued directly from our community needs. We had help coming from personnel of one of the most prestigious academic institutions of the country (National Polytechnic Institute, IPN because of its Spanish acronym), we have local workforce and natural resources and we are hardworking people willing to get out of the hole we are deep in, because of the wellbeing of next generations and pursuing the conservation of our beautiful environment, you just have to travel around the lagoon by boat, to appreciate the wide mangroves or to gaze at lovely dusk and dawn at the beach to fall in love with our land.

Community work, ©.

Our touristic development integral project was elaborated altogether with students and graduates from High Tourism School (belonging to IPN) who by means of a social service program backed us up to create it.

This project includes several stages which every of them are part of touristic services provision according to sustainability approach, these are: lodging, food and drinks service, aquatic transportation as well as alternative tourism activities.

The project is considered to be held in part of the land of common use belonging to the community, decision made by the most of the community people. It´s located in the spot known as “La Isla” and consists of 3 hectares (7.41 acres), of which at the moment only 1 has been used. This tiny island has amazing views of the breakwaters and of the zone that connects the lagoon to the sea, simply the sunsets and starry nights in this part of the Mexican Pacific are marvelous (see location map).

We pretend  to extend lodging size in order to have the capability to attend visitors on high seasons (summer and December) otherwise it will be insufficient our current capability, thinking of a midterm and long term project.

What can we offer?

The lagoon that surrounds our locality and some other smaller than ours it´s named Laguna Alotengo or Laguna Corralero (Corralero Lagoon or Alotengo Lagoon), it has a size about 5,000 hectares (12,355 acres). Inside this large ecosystem inhabit several amount of animal and flora wildlife species, as: red and white mangrove, pelican, spoonbill, great white egret, roseate spoonbill, stingrays, seabream and the main local dish, “tichinda”, small purple mollusk cooked in tamales, broth and ceviche among others. It´s important to point that many of these species are protected by Mexican laws and some are listed as in danger.

Landscapes are enormous and diverse all over the lagoon, with rock spots and a wide mangrove fringe, place where birds nest, ideal place for birdwatching. You should also consider the fact that alongside the lagoon water shades changes depending your ubication making the experience even better and given this way the chance to snorkel at some points.

Beyond all natural resources we have in our land to delight all visitors coming from all over the world, we have the warmness and kindness that we Mexican Black People can give, we are friendly and make you feel at home. We are a community that has understood taking care and respecting its resources, willing to be helped as well to work hard and provide an excellent service always looking for improve its quality life and wellbeing, please help us out and when you decide to visit us you will see that you have supported a good cause.

Even if this reach you and you as well as us don´t have the chance to support the cause with some money you will help us a lot if you share this with your social media contacts and friends, if this project reaches at least 5,000 people and every of them is able to give us 20 GBP/USD we´ll be done, the most people to see this and contribute is our goal.

We aim to once we achieve our goal give something back to all our supporters and donors, in function of the grade of help, going since a local dish, lodging in low seasons, trips by boat (lagoon and open sea), birdwatching, stars gazing, or something to make you up for your valuable help.

We can offer the next rewards program in exchange of every donation.

And to all our afrodescendant brothers out there we ask for your help, please share and come to visit us, with this we´ll be able to generate direct and indirect jobs that will assist our youth and a community in situation of poverty and marginalization.

Why do we need it?

5 years ago we faced the fact that fishing into the lagoon began to decrease, fact that depleted our income and propitiated that some of the community members search for an alternative, finding it in tourism, a dispersed and incipient tourism that had started to arrive in different seasons of the year and that camped at the beach and had meal with some villager.

By that time arrived groups of brigades of IPN students with some ideas to design productive projects with a participatory approach about how to generate through ecotourism an improvement in the way we used to live, changing our point of view and thinking of a well-planned tourism, taking just necessary and enough resources to keep an environmental balance, then we learnt that doing things without planning leads to decompensation, as did happen to our fishing ecosystem, we ran out fish and didn´t allow the system to recover its balance (we also asked for academic help to fish in a more efficient and sustainable way).

Due to that, we saw in ecotourism a possibility of change and we started the project Corralero Ecotourism Camp (with an approach of self-sufficiency through use of green technology), with technical support from the students and graduates.

Outside our borders it´s known the conditions of corruption and mismanagement of our governors, facts that break development of community projects, because of this from an economical subsidy we supposed to get we had nothing but a few money at the end. That´s the reason we come near this platform, in order to know if we can have your support to continue and end this sensible effort and through tourism have a worthy life and show our natural beauties, always with preservation and respect in mind.

It´s necessary to mention that even is unfinished our project we are already operating, giving lodging service in 4 rooms and in camping, having rainwater harvesting and energy from a few photovoltaic old cell donated to us by IPN students; we give local food service and some fishermen members of the community provide boat trips on their old ramshackle boats; we do our best efforts to improve our situation and with your help we could give a better and complete service, with better quality and in the future be a self-sufficient community, being that low incomes generated so far are spent into operating expenses and maintenance in order to keep alive the place.

What do we need it for?

As said before, there are so many lacks we have to can operate at 100% and can offer visitors suitable and quality service. We have overcome community organization stage and once legally constituted we are in the “know how” process to get some management and operational skills in order to have a correct handling of our resources through workshops and trainings given to us by young brigade personnel.

Talking about infrastructure and equipment we don´t have a deep well to supply fresh water to the camp, solar cells and batteries to catch and store energy (we don´t have access to public electricity system), a kitchen and the building of a restaurant (for food and drinks), lighting, furniture and a boat (even of second use) to be used solely for tourists.

To extend lodging size the project considers to enlarge camping zone with a bamboo building and the erection of 6 more rustic cabins made of local materials to be situated in the 2 remaining hectares (4.94 acres), this wat we´ll reach 10 lodging rooms and the complementary camping zone.

Some more necessary equipment are tents and sleeping bags (they will be rent to visitors), and relative to recreational activities designed to be enjoyed for tourists at first stage we require a kayak fleet to offer trips all over the lagoon and snorkel kits as well as binoculars for birdwatching and 2 telescopes for stars glazing and appreciate beautiful starry nights we have most of the year.

Camp activities, ©.

How much do we need?

Estimated amount is about  $96,000 USD, this to fulfill all stages of this local project, in order to have the complete service available for all visitors, including: lodging, aquatic transportation (even for recreation at open sea and at the lagoon), provide local food with emphasis in local cuisine and bar service, aquatic activities like kayak and snorkel, birdwatching and stars glazing, even in rustic buildings but with a complete and quality service, with the warmness that only coastal people can give.

All money you nobly donate to this cause will be used to buy material and equipment to reach our goals. It´s very important point out that as exists a Board of Directors also there are a Supervisory Board and a Brigade Committee from IPN, all they will supervise and audit frequently in order to all money collected be applied according to stablished project.

Nothing from money collected will be used for payment of salaries or anything else with no direct relation to the project, workforce is all provided by community members, “global help with local work”.

When will this project be finished?

If everything goes fine and we have the necessary financial resources we look forward to closing to the public from April 2018 on. First stage of the project, cabins building will last 3 months, at the same time we will be working on clearance and flatten the land to set the small solar farm and preparing the system to provide with energy to all the camp. Next stage consists in set and delimitate the paths and adjust infrastructure and equipment in order to have all ready to reopening on June 2018 and ready to welcome all visitors that arrive to our town and renewed camp in summer.

This is our Facebook fanpage: www.facebook.com/CampamentoCorralero/ , here you can send us messages or get in touch with us, in near future we hope to have a website with  an own domain. Through the page we will update images and information about the project stages and the advance in order all supporters can see their help applied.

We also have a mail account to receive any word you want to drop us or even if you want to visit us or know more about the project, it´s camp.eco.corralero@gmail.com , please help us to get further, as more people know about us the more quick we can start working.

Hope our English to be good and understandable, we are people with poor education and some members of the community because of lack of jobs had to migrate and look for better opportunities across the border in the USA. We tried to put in words all our people feelings to ask for help in this language, after that was reviewed and corrected by IPN guys.

We are the forgotten black people from Mexico, the third root.

Proud to be “Negros”

Sincerely:

Sociedad Cooperativa Campamento Ecoturístico del Ejido de Corralero.

You can donate here.