The United States invested heavily
in efforts to secure a lasting peace in El Salvador. The
USAID assistance program
has played an enormous part in the successful transition to
democracy and economic liberalization, which today stands as
a model for other post-conflict, developing nations. Yet, endemic
rural poverty remains a serious problem as more than 60% of
rural residents live in poverty. One manifestation of the poverty
is the exodus of Salvadorans to the United States, where more
than 1.5 million Salvadorans reside. By promoting equitable
economic development in tandem with the Agency’s new
Opportunity Alliance, USAID can have an impact on promoting
rural prosperity by strengthening democratic institutions,
addressing pressing environmental and social issues, and improving
the health conditions of women and children. The need for continued strong USAID support to El Salvador
became even more compelling with the enormous human and
economic suffering caused by the 2001 earthquakes. These
terrible disasters resulted in the loss of 1,159 lives,
produced almost $2 billion in damages, and destroyed or
severely damaged a wide swath of social infrastructure
including 277,000 homes. USAID’s response to these
disasters is the Earthquake Recovery Program (ERP). The
ERP has four major components, including the restoration
of community infrastructure; economic reactivation working
primarily with micro and small businesses and farmers;
disaster mitigation to assist El Salvador to better prepare
for future disasters; and the restoration of municipal
government infrastructure.
USAID/El Salvador continues to implement its core program
strategy, "Sustainable Development & Democracy
in El Salvador." The strategy focuses on helping to
consolidate peace, promote democracy and alleviate poverty.
The strategy consists of programs in Economic Growth and
Education (including promoting sound economic policies,
providing access to credit to micro and small enterprises
and small farmers, helping farmers diversify crops and
improve technology and marketing skills, and improving
access to quality basic education); Democracy and Governance
(including rule of law activities, strengthening municipalities,
encouraging citizen participation, promoting civil society
advocacy and supporting community policing initiatives);
Health (including expanding rural health care; improving
nutrition, breastfeeding and pre-natal care; preventing
and treating TB, diarrhea and HIV/AIDS; expanding the strategy
for management of childhood illnesses, and encouraging
decentralized delivery of health services); and Water and
Environment (including watershed protection, provision
of clean water, and education campaigns on water and hygiene).
Our target group for all of these programs is women, children
and youth living in poverty in rural areas.
Before the earthquakes struck, USAID/El Salvador was also
implementing another natural disaster program dedicated
to Hurricane Mitch recovery efforts. The activity was successfully
concluded ahead of schedule, resulting in an impressive
list of achievements in the areas of economic reactivation,
basic community infrastructure (roads, electrical lines,
wells, potable water systems, latrines, houses, and schools),
and environmental management and disaster preparedness
interventions.
The successes of the Mission’s strategy are a product
of close collaboration with the Government of El Salvador,
local and international NGOs, other donors and, of course,
the communities and people of El Salvador.
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