09 March, 2011
PIANTINI, S.D. – James Watson, Acting Director of USAID in the Dominican Republic visited today the Batey Relief Alliance’s headquarters in Santo Domingo where he met with the organization’s CEO, Ulrick Gaillard and other senior BRA personnel. Mr. Watson discussed the humanitarian contribution of the BRA to the Dominican Republic and Haiti and the strong partnership it has developed over the years with USAID.
Since 2005, BRA received from the USAID US $2.2 million to develop programs in health/HIV/AIDS, food security and community development inside vulnerable and impoverished Dominican’s bateyes and Haiti’s border communities.
Through a Family Health International-managed “CONECTA” HIV/AIDS project, BRA launched an aggressive HIV/AIDS/Tuberculosis education and prevention campaign to help control and reduce the disease alarming rates inside the bateyes in the region of Monte Plata. Through a Food for Peace (IFRP) initiative, BRA distributed 412.6 MT of high protein food products to 258,600 food insecure people living with HIV/AIDS/TB, vulnerable/orphan children, pregnant women, the elderly and quake-affected internally-displaced people. The food distribution program is now fused as a temporary nutritional bridge into BRA’s USDA-newly-funded agricultural/cooperative development program inside seven batey communities. In 2010, USAID became the first donor to fund BRA’s expansion work into Haiti’s Southeast border communities by organizing and training 600 women around issues of health, gender-based violence, food security, and financial/microcredit management. The women’s “Development Grants” empowerment program aims at building the capacity of Haitian women and providing them with loans to start new businesses and rebuild their quake-shattered communities.
