Hunger, Poverty, Pollution In Guatemala And Lake Atitlan

Government solutions coming up short; critics argue U.S. should do more to help

By Greg Szymanski, JD
May 2, 2010

According to a 2007 U.S. Agency for International Development report, at Guatemala’s slow rate of progress it would take more than 80 years to put an end to hunger and poverty among the country’s indigenous populations.

This is the reason why Save Lake Atitlan Mission wants to join the fight and help the Mayans of Lake Atitlan, an area severely hit by poverty and pollution.

“We will soon be organizing a relief center and work programs to bring people together to make a difference,” said a representative of the Mission, working both in the U.S. and Guatemala to raise awareness of the plight of the indigenous people in Guatemala.

Besides severe pollution at Lake Atitlan from a recent toxic cyanobacteria outbreak which left the water undrinkable, at a 2009 G8 meeting in Italy, the world’s richest countries led by U.S. President Barack Obama agreed to donate $20 billion to worldwide food security and agricultural development.

Save Lake Atitlan Mission www.savelakeatitlan.com along with several other charitable organizations helping in Guatemala think Guatemala would be a good candidate for the perfect “poster child” for this program since UN statistics show it has the sixth worst rate of chronic malnutrition in the world.

“We are going to try to ring the bell loud enough so even Obama hears it and gets some of that 20 billion to the indigenous populations in Guatemala and Lake Atitlan,” said Greg Szymanski, organizer of the Mission trying to raise worldwide awareness for Lake Atitlan.

In 2009, an Atlantic Monthly article by Samuel Loewenberg said “despite being what might be described as a relatively well-off lower-middle class country, indeed, the situation there bears little resemblance to the well-worn picture of skeletal children in African refugee camps.

“Measured by average GDP, Guatemala is doing fine economically. But that fact hides dramatic income inequality: while wealthy citizens live luxuriously in sequestered Guatemala City neighborhoods, the poor are barely noticed, living like feudal peasants in the countryside. Nearly half the children in this country of 13 million are chronically malnourished, according to the World Food Program.”

Lake Atitlan in the Western Highlands is another region in Guatemala where the rich meet head on with the poor.

Lake Atitlan is estimated to bring in $30 million annually from tourist dollors, according to 2002 government figures. However, behind the scenic lake and swank hotels, many visitors never really get to see the stark poverty conditions existing there.

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