The Garifuna People

The Garifuna People's Perseverance Through Climate Change

By Mikko Laulainen

Background

The Garifuna people are resilient to change, struggling first through oppression, and now, climate change. They have produced vast amounts of culture, merging the use of West African languages with others such as English, French, Spanish, and the Caribbean’s Arauak dialect (Mejia, 2012).

The Garifuna people of Honduras, Belize, Guatemala, and Nicaragua are descendants of escapees from European slave ships that had crashed in the 1630s (Goldapple, 2020). British persecutors then forced them to island-hop until they were able to settle on the coasts (Scott, 2018; Luedke, 2020). Despite escaping the British, they once again found themselves targeted by local authorities, labeled “invaders” in their own land. Citizens spoke of being wrongly detained and being told there were arrest warrants out for them but with no direct reason as to why (International, 2021). Through the interest of foreign investors, these same authorities have tried countless times to strip their land just for tourist attractions and capitalistic venues. In one attempt to claim ancestral land, national police and military forces evicted and ravaged the homes of 400 Garifuna people. (Soto, 2014).

With all these problems still being relevant to Honduras today, it is crushing to know that there is so much more hurting the coastal society. Climate change has been a growing dilemma slowly wearing away at the Garifuna people and causing a great deal of suffering in the process.

Figure 1: Honduras, TUBS

Honduras’ unique location in Central America partially accounts for its increased exposure to irregular and extreme weather. The area is prone to various disasters such as landslides, droughts, flooding, and the most impactful, hurricanes (Méndez, 2020).

Most notably, the back-to-back hurricanes just three years ago left a devastating impact on the communities. Category four hurricane Eta struck the coasts of Nicaragua on November 3rd, 2020. Hurricane Iota struck not two weeks later, on November 17th, 2020 (Philipp, 2021). Through their combined destruction, 94 people died and four million more were affected.

The devastation could not have come at a worse time as the country was already dealing with many problems including the outbreak of COVID-19, which was forgotten amid the chaos. Many were met with a grim reminder of Hurricane Mitch which had struck in 1998 (Tucker & Pindado, 2020). Mitch struck Central America killing over 11,000 people (Méndez, 2020). Honduras received much of the destruction with 6,500 deaths, 9,000 missing people, and over 1.5 million left homeless (Mejía, 2012). These tropical storms alone have accounted for much of the hardship Garifuna people have to endure, but why are they so prominent in Central America?

As it turns out, climate change and global warming have changed conditions in ways that amplify these tropical storms. Warmer temperatures create warmer water, which amplifies the melting of arctic ice caps. Warmer water at the surface level also allows hurricanes to pick up more water, increasing their size and power (Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, 2018). The warmer water creates a greater temperature difference between itself and the air, which translates to greater instability and resultingly, more turbulence, which then erratically speeds up the wind (World, 2016). However as previously mentioned, this is not the only problem Honduras is currently facing. Just as the waters have been affected, climate change has taken a toll on the lands as well.

Figure 2: Hurricane, SciJinks

Figure 3: Coffee Rust Disease, Wikimedia

Farming and food security have remained an issue through all other obstacles, droughts are one reason why. Just as this region suffers from tropical storms and a sudden influx of water, it also suffers from too little when it is needed. Droughts have led crops like beans to have substantially reduced harvests. Warmer weather in the mountains has also brought a fungus, coffee rust disease (pictured to the left), which has ruined coffee bean harvests. Lowering coffee prices in other areas of the world in addition to these ravaged crops forced many farmers to take out loans (Méndez, 2020). These problems are in addition to hurricanes, and many fields of crops are devastated not only during hurricanes but in every tropical storm that hits the area. In fact, many of these droughts are caused by disruptions in the weather, including wind patterns and water temperature (Rodgers, n.d.). To say the Garifuna people are resilient is an understatement.

Reasons For Hope

The Garifuna people are hopeful people, they are a community that works through challenges and a group that helps each other. In the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch, millions were left homeless, tens of thousands of whom started a migration north to the United States (Alexander, 2021). Those sights are what inspired a local group of Garifuna women to take it upon themselves to help. This group, later named The Garifuna Emergency Committee of Honduras, worked to help communities rebuild and learn, giving workshops and projects, while also continuing cultural traditions with educational festivals. In 14 years, they helped 16 communities, teaching locals how to grow traditional crops, practices that will help prepare for future disasters and droughts. They also made it a point to teach the kids about writing music in their native language and the importance of their traditional dances and instruments (Mejía, 2012). They have gathered international support and are one of many groups working to spread hope and awareness. Through traditional practices and cultural teachings, the group hopes to shore up not only physical communities but cultural ones as well.

Jimmy Andino, a resident of Honduras when Hurricane Mitch hit, spoke of his experience in the aftermath. For him, hope was brought through the people. There was another layer of devastation when a well-respected local mayor’s helicopter crashed with multiple government officials including himself inside. Losing a hopeful figure meant sticking together more than ever before. Everyone, no matter what their profession was, worked in shelters or delivered food. Jimmy himself assisted in ten helicopter delivery missions during this time. Aid was the top priority in years to come, but these 6 months were spent diligently working with everyone in the community, doing everything possible to help each other. In his words “It was a moment in our history of great solidarity.” (Andino, 2018; Stewart, 2018).

Insights and Applications

There are multiple ways to get involved, most being different organizations that accept donations. They use these donations to support Honduras with supplies and resources for development. There are also government agencies like USAID which have programs such as the HEWS (Honduras Emergency WASH and Shelter) program, which sends materials along with an expert to help teach select families how to rebuild utilizing the resources provided. To name a few donation-based organizations, here are some support groups in this line of work:

Project HOPE

Project HOPE has brought 250,000 masks to Honduras, traveling to the smaller villages where poverty tends to be the highest. They brought clean water to 3,000 families, additionally bringing them resources to continue to purify water indefinitely and have directly provided over 1,000 people with medical assistance. They pride themselves on crisis action and do similar work all around the globe (Project Hope, 2022; Philipp, 2021).

AMDA

AMDA is another organization in the line of crisis work. They provide Honduran people with food, coverings and hygienic supplies, along with milk and diapers for babies (AMDA, 2020; Philipp, 2021).

World Vision Philanthropy

World Vision is a Philanthropy group dedicated to the goal of bringing clean water to 650,000 people in Honduras by 2027. They have four hundred local staff, partnering with 1,000 churches to help the children grow up well. Gang violence is another large issue in Honduras and World Vision works closely through their THRIVE program to put kids on the right path when instead, they would be subject to gang exposure and pressure early on in their lives. The THRIVE program specifically works to reduce violence and better equip kids with skills to get good jobs in the future (World Vision, 2022).

Date: Fall 2022

Location: Belize, Honduras

Tags: Community Action