SAN PEDRO MASAHUAT, El Salvador -- Marta Sonia Ayala hunched over a metal table in a room that resembles a large restaurant kitchen, scooping heaps of a light brown powder into plastic bags. Later, she placed the bags of frijolito -- beans ground into flour -- in a heat-sealing machine, placed colored labels on them and shipped them to 22 stores throughout the country where they would sell for $1.35 a pound.
At the end of the month, Ayala and 47 other workers will each collect about $120 for their work. "Now I have my salary secure," Ayala said. In this rural town, few people earn steady paychecks.
Jose Armando Garcia and Marta Sonia Ayala put bean flour into bags. They are members of the farm cooperative in San Pedro Masahuat, El Salvador.
(Krissah Williams -- The Washington Post)
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Ayala's job is part of an experiment in changing how Salvadoran immigrants in the United States help people back in El Salvador. The intent is to redirect some of the estimated $2 billion that Salvadorans abroad send home each year -- with less going to such things as clothing, home improvements and soccer fields and more going to support businesses that can create jobs.
"Our country is now surviving because all the families are just waiting for money, and I hate to say it but [many] of these people don't work. We need to change that. The people who are sending this money are in my generation. The younger generation is not going to do that," said Elmer Arias, a Northern Virginia restaurant owner and president of the Cuscatlan Latino Center, a group that has donated $10,000 to the cooperative here.
"We need to invest this money in a more productive way," Arias said.
Arias said the Cuscatlan Latino Center, an Arlington-based alliance of 10 Salvadoran immigrant groups known as hometown associations, is planning to expand into other kinds of businesses, including, perhaps, a bakery and a chicken farm in El Salvador. It is also trying to persuade Salvadoran groups in Los Angeles and Las Vegas to participate in similar projects.
The group got involved with the co-op here after being approached by the Pan-American Development Foundation, a Washington-based nonprofit group founded in 1962 by the Organization of American States.
The foundation was asking hometown associations to join its economic development efforts in El Salvador. After unsuccessfully trying to interest groups in Los Angeles, which has the largest community of Salvadorans in the United States, it turned to the Washington region, which has the second-largest.
Some groups were skeptical, said Amy Coughenour-Betancourt, the foundation's deputy director. "There is an emotional side to giving. There is something extremely satisfying about building a soccer field for your community and buying uniforms and awarding a trophy."
"Giving long-term isn't as immediately satisfying. This project is a test," she said.
