The difference between a struggling family and a flourishing family is often just a single opportunity. Paula Pavon is one of many enterprising women from the Mestizo community of Pucura working to improve the lives of their families through community initiatives. And with the charitable building of a new vocational school, these women are seeing success in their small businesses.
Years ago, Paula’s husband Fernando started working as a bricklayer to provide for their little family. When construction work was scarce, he also performed small electric jobs. Paula earned extra money for her family doing agricultural work, but the need to be at home to care for her children cut that short.
Life improved for Paula when she formed a group with the women in her community to boost rural tourism. It wasn’t until CHOICE Humanitarian helped them strengthen their rural tourism initiative that the business began to thrive. CHOICE helped the women’s association of Pucura improve its services of accommodation and attention to foreign and national tourists. Now Paula and her companions receive extra income to improve the quality of their family’s lives and the conditions of their homes.
Since then, Paula and Fernando have also been able to obtain a loan from a bank and have rented a store in the center of the parish to run a small bakery. Fernando is looking into ways to manage and improve the family business while Paula continues to strengthen her rural tourism enterprise and they are hopeful that these two small businesses will succeed. Paula can now afford to provide a better education for her children, something that was only a dream a few years ago.
With the decision to build the Ecuador vocational school, Choice Humanitarian and Advancing Life Foundation have contributed to an increase in the number of tourists to the community. This contribution is allowing the women who host the tourists in their homes to earn money, hone their hospitality skills, and provide needed updates to their homes to accommodate future guests.