News
United States Supports New Youth Development Center to Benefit Quibdó Boys and Girls
With the support of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) a new youth Development Center was inaugurated on December 5, 2007. This youth center will benefit 4,350 Afro-Colombian boys and girls raised in Commune 6 in south Quibdo. The center is part of Quibdo’s Pies Descalzos School. Its inauguration took place during the childrens’ graduation ceremony. This center will help implement a new and comprehensive care service that will improve the standard of living of these boys and girls and their families. USAID contributed $209,000 US dollars and the total cost of the work was $390,000 US dollars. The construction of the venue was executed by the Pies Descalzos Foundation.
The project seeks to provide education, nutrition, and health care, training skills and employment to the children. The Youth Development Center will offer training in dressmaking and tailoring, arts and crafts, and ecotourism to prompt young boys and girls to create their own self-sustainable business plans and strengthen their projects into fruition.
Among those present in the event were Liliana Ayalde, USAID’s Mission Director for Colombia; Maria Emma Mejía, Chairman of the Pies Descalzos Foundation; John Spears from the Clinton Foundation and Max Goldensohn, Director General for Colombia of the Pan American Development Foundation (Fupad).
Bogotá D.C., 10 de diciembre de 2007