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> Posted by Jeffrey Riecke, Communications Associate, CFI
If you are in a wheelchair in Guatemala, lots of nice people will be willing to carry you up the stairs… But that’s not the point. A recent conversation with Alan Tenenbaum, a disability inclusion advocate based in Guatemala, offered me that perspective. Tenenbaum, who became a quadriplegic after suffering a spinal cord injury in his late twenties, focuses his work on the Latin American country. Those looking to advance disability inclusion in Guatemala, like in most countries, have their work cut out for them. Countrywide, according to Team Around the Child, less than two percent of Guatemalan adults with disabilities have work, most children with disabilities do not attend school, and only a small percentage of those in need of wheelchairs have one. To date, according to a recent paper from Trickle Up, most efforts to advance disability inclusion in Guatemala have been limited to urban areas – even though 50 percent of the country’s population resides in rural areas, where economic opportunities are harder to come by.
I sat down with Tenenbaum to get a sense for progress made and challenges still present in Guatemala for persons with disabilities (PwDs). Since his injury, Tenenbaum wrote a book sharing his story, En la Silla de Morfeo (On Morpheus’ Chair), started and led a foundation, Sigue Avanzando, and has regularly given speeches for schools, universities, news outlets, and private companies. At the heart of these efforts is what he identifies as the biggest barrier to disability inclusion: public awareness.
> Posted by Carol Caruso, Senior Vice President, Channels and Technology, Accion
Guatemala presents great potential to advance financial inclusion through the adoption of digital financial services (DFS). Only 22 percent of the population has a bank account with a formal financial institution – in most cases one of the three largest commercial banks – while almost every Guatemalan household has a mobile phone (8.8 million unique subscribers among a total population of 15.5 million). Yet most financial transactions are still conducted at bank branches. The logistics challenge of reaching isolated rural communities results in high distribution costs for the banking sector, hence it is no surprise that in 2012 Fitch Rating described the banking system as highly inefficient.
Some innovation in delivering financial services has taken place in the last few years. A few banks have implemented agent networks and the three mobile network operators now offer mobile financial services. But the results achieved are far from what the players and the supervisory authority were expecting in terms of usage and increased financial inclusion. For example, the leading mobile money service, Tigo Cash, is being used by MFIs in a limited way. Instead of empowering clients to use the available mobile wallet, clients primarily use Tigo agents for cash-in/cash-out transactions. While this over-the-counter (OTC) service through an expanded distribution channel has benefits and works in nascent environments, it is far below the potential of DFS in Guatemala.
> Posted by Joshua Goldstein aka Mr. Provocative
Since October, more than 52,000 unaccompanied children, mostly from Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala have illegally entered the United States, mostly through the Rio Grande Valley. Until the justice system processes their cases, they’re being held in miserably overcrowded border detention centers, military bases, and other facilities in Texas and elsewhere.
All kinds of reasons are given for this exodus – gang violence, lack of economic opportunity, the perception that under a “liberal president” amnesty will be granted. The policy wonks and talking heads can debate the causes of this humanitarian crisis and assign blame to their hearts’ content. And of course, we have to “study” the situation and make sure that if we allow some of these frightened minors to join family members in the United States, this doesn’t incentivize other youth to risk life and limb to set off on a dangerous journey from their homelands to reach the United States.
> Posted by Danielle Donza, Senior Program Specialist, CFI
When I recently heard about the documentary Living on One, a story of four students who spent their summer living on one dollar a day in a rural Guatemalan village, my first reaction was: I did that once! But by accident. And only for a weekend. Here is my dollar-a-day story.
On my way home from a year in China, I took advantage of some free time and traveled throughout South East Asia. As I roamed, I relied on savings I had in my local hometown bank in small-town Vermont. This bank was great in terms of knowing your name and having all the town gossip but left something to be desired in the 24-hour service department.
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