Dehydrators and people

 In the village of Tiron, natural resource extraction has become a way of life. Agriculture provides the largest amount of community income.  Mining in the village is a close second.  In both agriculture and mining the tools of the trade are very simple - hoe, plow, hammer.  Low technologies present very limited opportunities for personal development.

To be sure, swinging a hammer takes some skill.  And farming requires intuition acquired from years of experience.  And some people I have met in the village genuinely like the freedom and unstructured lifestyle of independent manual work.  But most people, including those who shape public policy, regard development as that process that equips people for better jobs.

Resource Exchange International, Inc. makes that process happen in the village of Tiron.  Dehydrating technology, which represents a higher technology than hammers and hoes, facilitates development of individual competencies.  REI has invested in the research and development of dehydrators that have been successfully deployed in village areas, including the village of Tiron.  Through the introduction of these technologies, people are built and the prospects of community development are enhanced.

Building people to build a nation . . . one dehydrator at a time.

Yummy Scones

You have already figured out that Java Bite dried mangos have a cool story.  But if you are from North America, you may not know exactly what to do with dried mangos.  As a snack, Java Bite dried fruit is an excellent choice for health conscious consumers.  And you like having a nutritious snack with a cool story.  Now you want to venture out and explore other ideas.  Here is a winner . . . Mango Scones!

The experienced baker will take note of step 3.  An inexperienced person, like myself, will think that it really doesn't matter how you cut butter into flour.  Wrong!  Be careful to keep the flour from caking together, which is the purpose of the knives.  Applying the proper technique will yield a light, fluffy result.

Give it a try!  And post your comments here!

Pivotal Moments

The pivotal moments of one's life are not always recognized as such.  There is no doubt that a moment like September 11, 2001, for it's horrific magnitude was certainly recognized as a pivotal moment.  But perhaps not in the way that most people think of pivotal moments.

Nationalism changed.  At least for a while.  At the time, being an American evoked emotion and devotion unlike any period I had lived through.

International warfare changed.  As Americans, we knew we were hated more than we knew the reasons why and more than we knew the identities of those who hated us.  National security required new tactics.

Public policy changed.  A sympathetic view emerged that supposed that anti-American attitudes originated from constrained economic opportunities.  A fresh agenda emerged that attempted to address economic underdevelopment in countries that had anti-American populations.

I changed.  Although I had already focused my attention on the economic development of rural areas in Asia, a new demographic captured my attention.  Countries where Islam is the majority religion got on my radar and stayed there.  As I probed villages in Indonesia, it became clear that natural resource extraction, rather than innovation, drove economic development.  Although agricultural research and development has improved productivity, the gains from those efforts have not exceeded the returns to labor of rock extraction in locations where suitable construction materials can be obtained.  In places, like rural villages in Indonesia, where extraction dominates innovation the local economy abandons value creation as a driver.  Consequently, their economic prospects diminish.  I didn't fully grasp these notions eleven years ago when my life direction shifted unnoticeably.  

Eleven years ago I never imagined I would be championing products from rural Indonesia.  I never imagined I would be promoting value-added technologies and processes that could double the annual incomes of those who participated.  I never imagined that I would be training a group of villagers to acquire skills and abilities that help them do more than just extract rock from the mountains and streams in their area.

On September 11, 2001, the direction of my life changed.  It wasn't because of nationalism or international conflict or public policy or anything else that might have changed on that day.  It was my own pivotal moment, which was hardly recognized as such.

Site Search

Near the production location I surveyed this piece of land as a possible factory site.  But I went in disguise because my white skin literally doubles the price!  Land acquisition is tricky business in a densely populated, developing area.  So, off I went on the back of a motorcycle with my skin cloaked with a jacket and my face covered with a full face helmet.  Accompanied by an ally - Mr. Jem, the farmer group leader we have equipped and trained- I discreetly walked through the property, keeping my helmet on so as not to reveal my features.  Mr. Jem explained, "If anyone sees you, word will spread quickly through the neighborhood and the price will go up a lot."  

His point was illustrated perfectly the previous day, when I visited a different site.  The person who met us in the field was not the owner but a village leader who apparently had enough clout to insert himself in the middle of a land transaction that included a foreigner.  We previously received information from the owner, indicating that the land cost was within our budget.  During my discussion at the site with the village leader, the price had clearly doubled, with you-know-who getting the difference.  I'm pretty sure there is a less expensive way to build a friendship with this guy!  So now we simply walk away from that option and look into something else.  So many twists and turns as we build people to build a nation!