Our Team
General Overview
Nicaragua is a country of 5.1 million people with a land area slightly smaller than the state of New York, making it the largest country in Central America. Its climate is tropical and it is home to rainforests of great beauty and biodiversity. Its lush landscape is made dramatic by a spine of volcanoes that run along the Pacific Coast.
Its economy is based on manufacturing and agriculture, with the export of coffee, seafood, sugarcane and meat bringing in the most revenue; as a whole, the country has a very low level of industrialization. Nicaragua is considered the third poorest country in the Americas.
In 1980, Nicaragua embarked on a path of profound political change with the defeat of the Somoza regime and the beginning of democratic and social reforms including a constitution supporting the rights of its citizens. In 2005, Nicaragua marked its 25th anniversary as a democratic state. The country has a political system with two major parties, the Liberales, a conservative party, and the FSLN, a progressive party, with a host of minor parties spanning the political spectrum. Nicaragua has a tripartite system of government with executive, unicameral legislative and judicial branches. National and regional elections are held every six years.
LEON, NICARAGUA
ViviendasLeon is headquartered in Leon, a city two hours northwest of the capital, Managua. Our program participants live and explore the city and work in the outlying rural communities. With a population of approximately 160,000, it is the second largest city in Nicaragua. Leon is a Spanish colonial city founded by the conquistador Hernandez de Cordoba in 1523. It was the capital of Nicaragua for more than 200 years until 1858. Leon lies in a broad agricultural plain bordered to the west by the Pacific Ocean and to the east by a string of volcanoes, some active and others dormant. León has earned its reputation as the intellectual and progressive center of Nicaragua; the city is home to both the National Autonomous University, UNAN, offering degrees in sciences and economics leading to higher degrees in medicine, pharmacology and economics, and the National School of Law, UCN. The city's main attractions are its Cathedral - the largest in Central America, museums of local folkloric culture, a revolutionary history museum and a new art museum in a recently restored Casa Vieja near the Central Plaza. León also has a thriving cultural center that offers classes in dance, music and fine arts.
León is also a very international city. Because of its beauty and political importance, many people from around the world travel to León. There are many well-established aid organizations including CARE, the United Nations, and Save the Children. There are also hundreds of Non-Governmental Organizations or NGOs, working on development projects with communities throughout the region. These NGOs originate from many foreign countries such as Austria, Germany, Denmark and Japan. From the United States, organizations from Connecticut, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and New York contribute greatly to León's infrastructure.
WHY IS VIVIENDASLEÓN WORKING IN NICARAGUA?
Nicaragua is considered the third poorest country in the Americas. Here are some reasons why:
- 48% of Nicaraguans (2.3 million) lives below the poverty line, 16% in extreme poverty
- 1 in 3 children suffers from chronic malnutrition
- Over 50% of people in rural communities have no access to sustainable drinking water
- 20% of the adult population is illiterate
- 24% of children do not attend school; of those who do attend, fewer than 1/3 complete primary education
- 45% of all income goes to the richest 10% of the population
- a public debt at 87% of GDP and an industrial growth rate of -6%
- poor infrastructure that makes rebuilding after challenges such as tropical hurricanes slow to non-existent
- a Human Development rank out of 182 is 124 (U.S. rank =13; Haiti =149)*
- Its per capita gross national product is $453/yr.
(sources: UNICEF, UNGEI)
*The Human Development Report annually publishes “the human development index (HDI) which looks beyond GDP to a broader definition of well-being. The HDI provides a composite measure of three dimensions of human development: living a long and healthy life (measured by life expectancy), being educated (measured by adult literacy and gross enrollment in education) and having a decent standard of living (measured by purchasing power parity, PPP, income).”
After ten years of working in Nicaragua, Evan Markiewicz founded ViviendasLeón, a 501 c 3 corporation, in 2003 to address the complex causes of poverty common in the developing world, using models of development that are local, sustainable and replicable.
ViviendasLeon achieves this by:
- Building schools and other structures
- Introducing U.S. students to world citizenship through our travel programs
- Investing in economic development through small-scale cooperative business projects
- Leveraging our efforts by continually introducing new organizational partners who provide additional development programs to the communities.
Rural construction projects are designed to benefit the community, with each community deciding which project it will undertake. Most have chosen schools, which improve access to education - a principal cornerstone of lasting development, and housing - which improves family living standards. The majority of projects are built using rammed earth, a traditional construction method VL has reintroduced and updated through research and experimentation.
Development is not limited to material goods. Rural communities need support through education opportunities, adult training and economic development projects. When combined with construction, human capacity building and economic development work together to rebuild rural communities and improve the standard of living for rural families.
WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT NICARAGUA OR OUR WORK?
Check out NicaNews (see menu bar) for current news articles and our updates from the field, or one of these websites:
The World Factbook
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/nu.html#Geo
The World Health Organization
http://www.who.int/countries/nic/en/
National Association of Independent Schools: Educating for Global Citizenship
http://www.nais.org/about/seriesdoc.cfm?ItemNumber=148793&sn.ItemNumber=146810
The International Development Research Centre
http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-82311-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html