How Does Miracles In Action Work?

Our team of volunteers seeks out under served pockets of need in rural Guatemala and we research projects that focus on  education, vocational training, and sustainable development (clean water, safe stoves, latrines,...). "Miracles" board then selects those projects that achieve long-term results, improve quality of life, and allow truly impoverished people to help themselves. 

Why do we work in rural Guatemala?
Sometimes we are asked “Why not help the poor in our country?”  In the US there are poor people, but there are also government and social programs to assist the poor.  In Guatemala there are no such programs.  The poor in Guatemala are at the level of "extreme poverty", defined by Economist Jeffery Sach (author of "The End of Poverty") as - when every day is a struggle just to be alive - no basics like food, water, and warm shelter, surviving on less than $1 per day.  

Photos taken inside coffee plantation barracks, where 100s of "desperate for work" indigenous people are packed into unsanitary living conditions.  Toddlers are left alone, while their mother and siblings pick coffee in the fields for $1-2/day.

Where the idea started?
Extreme poverty can lead to poor families living at garbage dumps scavenging for something to eat or sell.  They know no other way to survive. 

Photo taken by Penny Rambacher at Quito, Ecuador garbage dump in 1999. Noreen Rambacher is giving this malnourished boy the only thing she had at the time - a Hershey Kiss. The boy put a face on poverty and made it real.  We had to do something.  

This website highlights what they, and others, have done to "Help Poor People to Help Themselves.” 

“Give a child a fish and he eats for a day.  Give a child a fishing lesson and he eats for a life time.”  Penny Rambacher, President/Founder Miracles in Action