Collaboration is key.

       This past week I worked with one of the members of Pushaq Warmi, the women’s group I work with through Women’s Global Connection, and Sembrando Infancia, the public health project I volunteer with, on a workshop for some moms in Cambio Puente.

            Since Cambio Puente is out in a rural area they have easy access to fresh milk. If they were to sell the milk directly they’d get about 1.50 soles per liter sold. This is pretty decent since it doesn’t cost a whole lot to raise partially free-ranging milk cows. Not all the women in Cambio Puente have the time, space or ability to raise milk cows however.

            Sandra, the member from Pushaq Warmi, and I needed to come up with a creative way to capitalize on the milk readily available in Cambio Puente.

It just so happens that Sandra knows how to make yogurt. 

Day 1: Preparing the milk to ferment.

            After purchasing the milk, the bacteria for fermenting the milk, the sugar, fruit and a few other ingredients, the total cost of producing yogurt is around 2.50 soles per liter. Yogurt sells at around 4.50 soles per liter in the market, and sometimes women sell small individual servings on the street for a sol each, and there are about five or six servings in one liter, making yogurt pretty profitable.    

            One thing I think is cool is that the whole process is local. By making yogurt, the women are supporting local dairy producers as well as increasing their own incomes. Another plus is that since the yogurt is homemade, it’s naturally pro-biotic, high in calcium and protein, making it a better alternative to a package of cookies.

Day 2: The yogurt turned out. Here Sandra is adding the strawberry marmalade she made the day before.

            The women were excited to learn how to make it, especially now that it’s summer and yogurt is popular around this time. The two-day workshop was a success and the yogurt turned out good. Sandra was worried that the bacteria wouldn’t take because it needs a really clean environment to grow, and Cambio Puente is pretty dusty.

            The women came from a group called Vasos de Leche which is daily breakfast program for children in high-poverty areas. Every morning children in Vasos de Leche receive a free breakfast by going to one of these women’s houses. Usually a glass of hot milk and some type of grain like oatmeal or quinoa. For this reason, most of them should already have all the implements needed to start making, and hopefully selling, yogurt right away.

            Sandra is going to talk with the rest of the women from Pushaq Warmi and their next meeting to see if projects like this will be something that they choose to do more of in the future.

            Next, the women want to learn how to make cheese, but we’re going to take things one step at a time.

Sandra and I with the yogurt entrepreneurs.