MOFGA's El Salvador Sistering Committee
MOFGA’s El Salvador Sistering Committee
MOFGA’s El Salvador Sistering Committee maintains a relationship between MOFGA and two Salvadoran grassroots organizations working toward sustainable agriculture. The committee explores issues such as organic certification, free trade, marketing, mining, climate change, etc., that affect farmers in both countries.
Several delegations from Maine have visited El Salvador, and delegates from El Salvador have come to Maine to tour farms and participate in the Common Ground Country Fair.
Each April, the El Salvador Sistering Committee hosts an Empty Bowl Supper in Belfast to raise funds for the ongoing collaborative work. Dinner guests make donations to the efforts, enjoy a hearty meal, and take home beautiful, handcrafted bowls made by Maine artisans. We are always looking for donations of handmade bowls (including seconds!) from potters.
U.S. – El Salvador Sister Cities
The MOFGA-El Salvador Sistering Committee works closely with the U.S.-El Salvador Sister Cities (USESSC) network, a grassroots organization of U.S. citizens and residents who have ongoing partnerships with small rural communities in El Salvador. Those partnerships began in 1986 as a citizen-based response to the U.S. intervention in El Salvador’s civil war. Today, 17 U.S. sistering groups are paired with Salvadoran communities or organizations in six of El Salvador’s 14 departments. The Association for the Development of El Salvador, or CRIPDES, facilitates these efforts. Sister Cities works to connect and strengthen movements for social justice in the United States and El Salvador by sharing experiences, support and accompaniment. The organization strives to build a new kind of globalization, one built from the ground up and united by human values of justice and solidarity. More information about Sister Cities.
