Katie and Sarah Miles

In the last issue of the SRF Newsletter, we briefly mentioned that Katie and Sarah Miles from
Birmingham had been working with our partner organisation, the Berriz Missionary Centre,
in the El Viejo area of Nicaragua. They were there as a result of contacting the Santa Rosa
Fund, and their primary purpose was to conduct research into disaster preparedness and
response. During their time there they faced a tornado, were stranded in a national bus strike,
and witnessed first-hand disaster response to severe flooding caused by Hurricane Stan.

Although they spent only a month there, they witnessed poverty enough to come back
determined to raise money for the Santa Rosa Fund and the work of the nuns in El Viejo.
Through friends, family and talks and reports – like the one shown here which appeared in
The Wilmslow Express in January – they managed to raise over £1,000, all of which they
donated to the Fund. The Miles family took the decision to go without Christmas presents in
2005 and to donate all the money that they
would have spent on them to Katie and Sarah’s
chosen cause, the Santa Rosa Fund, fully aware
that much of the Fund’s financial resources
would go to support the projects run by the nuns
of the Berriz Missionary Centre in El Viejo.

Sarah said: “Our time in Nicaragua has made us

aware of how important political pressure and
campaigns such as Vote for Trade Justice are to
raise awareness of the international rules and
regulations that keep countries such as this in
poverty in order to serve the needs of the rich.
The scale of the issue is so huge that we cannot
resolve it single-handedly, but we can play a small part by raising awareness and raising
money to continue the good work we saw in operation whilst we were out there.”

It goes without saying that the Fund is immensely grateful to Katie and Sarah.

To support the evidence of Katie and Sarah’s eyes, the following figures relate to the
department of Chinandega (in which is located the town of El Viejo and the Cosigüina
Peninsula), and they highlight the need for further support for educational initiatives in the
region. Rick and Pat’s report on pages 3-5 of this newsletter gives some details of the support
the Fund has given this year. Perhaps the Santa Rosa Fund can improve on this next year –
certainly the need is great.

The figures were presented in a Forum organised by Save The Children and held in
Chinandega in March this year. The total population of the department of Chinandega is
441,300.

Pre-school children absent from school 28,091

Primary aged children absent from school 19,004
Secondary aged children absent from school 27,465
Children working 1,717
Disabled children not attending school 2,311
Illiterate children under the age of 14 17,854
 Illiterate children over the age of 14 11,287

The presentation also listed reasons for school absence, including:

Child labour (including domestic work)

Unemployment and poverty
Migration
Distance from school
Lack of access to suitable facilities for special needs children
Parental attitudes
Agricultural production cycles
Parental illiteracy
Climate
Lack of food and illness
Lack of understanding from teachers
Family disintegration

Another supporter of the Santa Rosa Fund, Sara Roberts, is currently researching the issue of
child labour and child slavery for a BBC programme which is expected to be produced in
2007. The programme may use some examples from the area surrounding the town of El
Viejo in the Cosigüina Peninsula.