Reports- Bolivia- Ghana

I was a participant in the Workshop on Psychological and Physical Rehabilitation in the Community held in November, 1998, at the Golda Meir Mt. Carmel International Training Center in Haifa. The knowledge gained from the workshop has enabled me as the National Coordinator for the Ministry of Health Community Based Rehabilitation Program (CBRP) of People with Disability (PWDs) to plan, design and implement more training programs in Community Based Rehabilitation and also to plan projects for the improvement of in-service training programs in health that prepare improved psychiatric patients for rehabilitation in their communities. The experience gained during the course on how to work with people from different cultural backgrounds is very helpful in my work.

Report - Bolivia
by Emilio Cano Escobar

I am a graduate of MASHAV's Course on Cooperative Agricultural Industrialization, which took place at the Center for Labor and Cooperative Studies for Latin America in Tel Aviv in 1984. (Note from Editor: the 1993 the Center was amalgamated with the Afro-Asian Institute and the Institute for Eastern and Central Europe to become the International Institute-Histadrut.) Thanks to the training I received in Israel, and together with my colleagues, we established the Cochabamba Integrated Services Cooperative. This is an organization of small rural producers of the Alto Valley region in Cochabamba, Bolivia. The Cooperative employs 24 people, technicians, agronomists and administrative personnel, who work for the benefit of over 3,400 active members. The services that the Cooperative offers are targeted credit for general agricultural production, supply of inputs through a central store and subsidiaries, marketing and technical administrative assistance.

In 1996, thanks to a direct loan that we received from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB, or in Spanish, Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo, BID), we were able to carry out an integrated dairy development project. The main purposes of this project are the improvement of quality and quantity of milk production among our members, achieved by the establishment of ILVA, the Alto Valley Dairy Industries. This is a milk processing plant where we process about 4,500 liters per day into pasteurized milk, yogurt, flavored milk and cheeses. We also deal with the marketing of these products both in the Alto Valley region and in the city of Cochabamba. In the future we aim to process at least 10,000 liters per day. By this initiative, our Cooperative hopes to contribute to the improvement of the living conditions of the local rural population, by consolidating more small enterprises of milk producers, and by encouraging the local population, especially women and children, to consume more dairy products.

I would like to thank you for the regular sending of Shalom Magazine. The Cooperative's technical and administrative personnel share its important educational material.