Local volunteers to build new homes in Nicaragua

A group of 16 adults from the National Avenue Christian Church went to Nicaragua Jan. 7 to help build homes in partnership with Rainbow Network. The volunteers will return to Springfield Jan. 15, according to an announcement from Rainbow Network, a Christian ministry that provides health care, education, economic development and housing to the poor in Nicaragua.

The volunteers are working side-by-side with the Nicaraguan families who will purchase and live in the new homes. The volunteers will work at a Rainbow Network housing project in rural Nicaragua. There are 25 new homes under construction in the development.

In addition to sending the volunteers, National Avenue Christian Church also is providing funding for two new houses each of which will have concrete block walls, a cement floor, a fuel-efficient vented stove and a corrugated metal roof at a total cost of about $2,000 per house. The new dwellings will replace the dirt-floored, parasite-infested shacks that more than 96 percent of the residents of rural Nicaragua inhabit.

Per capita annual income in Nicaragua is $2,700, and less than $800 per family in rural Nicaragua. The country is considered the second-poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere after Haiti.

Rainbow Network, a nondenominational organization, specializes in long-term, partnership-based community development programs. The organization assists about 40,000 Nicaraguans in five regions covering more than 1,500 square miles.

Information about the organization's efforts is available online at www.rainbownetwork.org.