Global Community Partners: GCP Update: Global farms are fascinating!

Friday, July 17, 2009

GCP Update: Global farms are fascinating!

Happy July! Hope you are enjoying your summers (or winters, for those of you who live in the southern hemisphere)!

Summer is here and I have taken some time off to do virtually nothing related to work or school, which was really nice but now, it's back to work. I did do something that has really gotten me excited about what lies ahead for GCP though: I visited a farm. It wasn't just any farm, but rather a global farm -- located in Fort Myers, Florida. The farm is a sort of "clearinghouse" for agricultural techniques as well as plants. It is a "global" farm because it gathers information for most tropical areas all over the world. Their focus is to assist poor communities around the world in finding affordable ways of growing their own food. Why is this so exciting for GCP? I think that it can contribute to what we want to do in Malawi because it addresses not only the primary mode of sustenance but also the poverty aspect. The farm is called ECHO and they also conduct workshops to learn more about specific crops and techniques addressing, for example, those communities impacted largely by HIV/AIDS. They are also able to provide assistance with seeds and various soil and farming issues. So it is definitely something we are going to incorporate into our work in Malawi. If you click on the title of this blog entry, it should lead you to some pictures we took while touring the farm.

If you have any questions or are interested in learning more about the ECHO Global Farms, let me know.

Other than that, I'm attempting to study for part 2 of my qualifying exams that take place at the end of this summer, and the rest of our staff members are having some adventures of their own.

Please pray for Sylvia who is actually in Africa (Guinea to be exact) on a mission trip with her church. Please pray for safety, health, and a time of learning for her.

Please pray for Jack who is in a time of transition. Please pray for guidance and for doors to open.

Please also pray for GCP and our "brewing" stage - although things are a bit quiet, we are working on some pieces that we hope will come together in the near future, so please pray for wisdom on our parts.

I apologize if this all sounds a bit disjointed. My brain must still be recovering from the spring semester and part 1 of my qualifying exams. :)

Have a great rest of the month!! And thanks for your continued interest and support.

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Our Vision

Global Community Partners’ vision is to build partnerships in developing community around children all over the world. Supporting this vision are our guiding values that are integral to our organization. All our guiding values are based upon a way of work and life as followers of Jesus. We are a Christian organization that believes in one God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and believe further that Jesus lived, died, and rose again. We believe that Jesus is an integral part of our lives and in Him, we see the example of how we are to care for those around us. Our work is guided by the following principle beliefs:

Children’s Rights

- We believe that children are vitally important to the improvement of our future. As delineated in the UN Convention of Children’s Rights and other such documents, children have rights that must be valued and protected, particularly in those places where poverty and crises exist.

Child-focused Community

- We believe that his/her environment, immediate, and removed, influences every child. Therefore, focus on children must also include education of the immediate community and raising the awareness of the global community. We believe in providing tools for the immediate and global communities through education, support, and training.

Community Partnership

- We believe in partnerships, partnerships with existing communities to help build a stronger, empowered community that can in turn help empower their children. We believe in building relationships in these communities and we believe in long-term goals rather than short-term goals, or one-time trainings, meaning that we are willing to work on an on-going basis with communities to provide input, education, and training on a long-term and on-going basis. These community partnerships include governmental organizations, non-governmental organizations, and other entities.

Respect for Culture

- We respect the cultural diversity of the global community and therefore believe in working with each community on an individual basis to incorporate cultures and traditions in coming up with a viable way to improve community. We believe in being responsible and maintaining respect for the communities we work with, the culture, the traditions, and the environment.

Overall Principle

- We believe that people, particularly children and their families, are integral and central to our work and to that end, we commit to uphold these guiding principles in the presence of God and of each other. We believe that there is no substitute for the manner in which we think, work, and live and our commitment to these guiding values must be evident in our interaction with each other, the communities we work with, and the global community at large.
Targeted beneficiaries will ultimately be children, but beneficiaries will also include the community around these children – families, immediate and extended, as well as other adult community members. Activities that GCP will undertake include research, program development, and implementation of programs as well as monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of program.