Carolina Copa represents CEDSPAR and AgroTe at a trade show.

CEDESPAR's board of directors meet with Apostle Carlos Enrique Mejia

Making a Difference in Bolivia

The story of CEDESPAR in Bolivia—according to many calculations the poorest nation in the Americas—is the story of Community of Christ.

Thirty years ago the United States of America sent Peace Corps volunteers to Bolivia. Among them were Community of Christ members Duane and Marlene Anderson, who fell in love with the country. After their Peace Corps service, Duane earned a community-development degree back in the USA. Then they returned to Bolivia. They raised their family there and dedicated their lives to the people of this beautiful land.

Duane and Marlene describe their faith as holistic. As disciples of Jesus they cannot separate people’s spiritual and material needs. They have tried to live out the spirit of Section 163 of the Doctrine and Covenants since years before the document even appeared, quietly encouraging others to join them.

The work began in a town called Chapare. They helped form an organization called Equipo Chapare to promote development in poor communities and help with various farming techniques and family necessities. Drug trafficking was a major problem in the tropics of Bolivia. These projects gave families and their children alternatives to the drug trade.

Eventually, the work moved from the tropics and into the city of Cochabamba, where CEDESCO formed. Continuing with the same line of work, CEDESCO helped produce strawberries, raspberries, and marigolds for sale. That provided income for thirty-five families. Eventually, CEDESPAR became, the successor to CEDESCO, born of a new generation in cooperation with more-experienced leaders.

When CEDESPAR began in November 2006, Nelson Copa, then twenty-eight, became the first director. He and several other CEDESPAR leaders are among the first generations of indigenous Bolivians to attend university in any number. Grounding in a holistic Christian faith and being raised around the work of Equipo Chapare and CEDESCO gave these young adults a strong desire to help their own community.

CEDESPAR leaders also are key leaders of Community of Christ in Bolivia. A children’s Bible school has run for years out of Simon Copa’s home in Sacaba, just outside of Cochabamba. It has given the church and CEDESPAR a chance to work with the community in holistic ways. While responding to spiritual needs of children and families, CEDESPAR worked to help complete a potable-water project, bringing indoor plumbing to neighborhood families.

Those relationships led to a request for Marlene Anderson to teach neighborhood women a little about baking breads and cakes. But the vision of these Bolivian young adults always seems to transform into grander projects to help the people around them. The Light of Day women’s group established itself with a board of directors in August 2005. Members began selling baked goods and handicrafts and soon began studies to become professional bakers.

In June 2008 The Light of Day Bakery opened, selling reasonably priced, high-quality bread to the neighborhood. Funding came from proceeds of craft and bread sales and the Community of Christ World Hunger Fund. CEDESPAR provided technical aid in setting up the bakery and in grant writing. It continues to support the bakery as it strives to be self sufficient.

Health-food supplements based on green tea.

Meanwhile CEDESPAR had its eyes on Chapare, the tropical area where its grandparent organization, Equipo Chapare, started years ago. It was drawn to the potential of a tea growers’ cooperative there. The tea growers had built a successful business. Their AgroTe tea and green tea, with their organic certification and trademarks, had become popular throughout Bolivia.

But the growers depended on a U.S. government-funded packaging plant to get their product to market. When the packager’s commitment expired, the cooperative was left without a way to get the products to market. Growers’ income dropped about two-thirds.

CEDESPAR has been working with AgroTe to get the market back and expand it. First, supporters helped establish a manual tea-packaging plant, winning back some capacity. They fed each tea bag individually through a bagging machine. Now a Community of Christ World Hunger grant has helped buy an automated machine. It will allow the sixty-eight families growing tea for AgroTe and the thirty-five families working in the processing plant to return to work and again put food on their families’ tables.

CEDESPAR is working with tea producers and other growers in the Chapare area to identify better ways to bring various crops to market. In particular they are studying a system for producing dried fruit that would reduce waste at harvest time and provide a marketable and nutritious product to sell.
These young adults have decided to transform their country. Using skills learned over the years of working with the Andersons, in Community of Christ, and at university they are well on their way to doing just that.

—Art Smith reporting