Our community now sees the value of care work

My name is Yoraima Cristina Navarro Izquierdo. I am a leader and an active member of the Arhuaco community, and also the mother of four children. As part of an Indigenous people, the essence of our community is caring for all the living beings on our territory. But it has taken time for us to recognize the value of that care work and the women providing it.

I was born on the northern face of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, in Colombia. From a very young age, I was a leader. This was true in school and then university. I always had a revolutionary spirit. Not in the sense of wanting to stir trouble but wanting to do more and to help people.

Leadership was something that I saw in my mother and in my grandparents. They were always serving their community. My mother dedicated all her time to caring for her people. When I was growing up, my house was never empty. There was always a plate of food and shelter for those who didn’t have a place to stay. When my mother passed away, it was as if my life had split in two. But I decided that the best way to honour my mother was to keep doing what she did — helping those in need.

Back then, I could see so many needs among the women in our territory. So, in 2020, I decided to form Josa Constructoras de Paz – Josa Peace Builders – an organisation dedicated to valuing the work of our women weavers. It was an act of resistance in honour of all those mothers who have sustained the territory and brought food to their homes by crafting mochila (traditional woven bag).

The mochila is truly part of the economy of our people. It is a practice that should be protected and recognized. For us, mochila are just as important as other products like coffee, cacao, or sugarcane. But sadly, they are given less value. The intermediaries who buy the mochila want to pay 30,000 or 50,000 pesos for each one. But when you go to fairs or exhibitions, you find prices of between 400,000 and 600,000 pesos. The act of intermediating is not bad in itself. But it shouldn't be unjust.

Through Josa Peace Builders, we are forming alliances and empowering women so that their work is not undervalued.

When we met the team from the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) Cooperative Care Provision programme, we came to understand they had the same goal as our organisation: to make visible the work that women do in the territory. They were very respectful of the essence of the Arhuacos people and of our pace. It took several months of dialogue before we knew how we wanted to be part of the programme to recognize the work that women do in the area of care.

We, as Indigenous people, do not only care for ourselves. We care for everything in our territory, from the smallest being to the largest, from the stones to the rivers. Without territory, without land, we are nothing. Before joining the programme, we knew that we provided care every day, but we didn’t recognize that we were doing care work.

In the beginning, recognizing the care that we provide was a difficult subject within the community. But we worked together with the mamos (spiritual leaders) and the authorities, and they were able to truly understand what we women wanted: to continue strengthening the territory.

It was important to talk about the care economy in the community because this had never been discussed before. Never had there been talk of the five Rs of care work: recognize, redistribute, reduce, reward, and represent. Then, after several months of visits from the ILO to the territory, we started envisioning a way to ease the overload for our women: a care house.

At first, the mamos asked whether this care house would really be good for our people. Eventually, we received the green light for two small houses. Then one day, they said, “Look, we have a surprise for you. We’re going to give you a bigger space.” That meant they understood it is truly important because this will also strengthen the territory.

The care house will offer early childhood services. Women will be able to continue their training and professional studies. They will be able to attend their medical appointments. It should serve as a learning space for the families of our people.

And when there are community meetings, women can leave their children at the care house. It won’t just be the men going to those activities. Women will also be able to take part in decision-making in our community.

The care house will have three people from our community heading it up. They have received training in occupational health, nursing, food handling, and early childhood caregiving.

With them, the children will learn the traditional songs in the Iku language, so that our culture stays alive. The house will also provide complementary meals based on our people’s diet — maize, grains, root vegetables, and all the natural products in our Arhuaco diet.

Above all, we want this care house to be a successful pilot for replication in other communities. So that we can help to reduce the overload many mothers face.

Today, the 250 women of the Arhuaco territory that are part of Josa Peace Builders feel more empowered. We dream that, in the future, Josa Peace Builders will continue to grow. We want it to be a strong organization where women’s work is valued and where women can change their lives.

I hope to be able to reach every corner of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, to provide training even in the most remote mountain areas. I want to bring a voice to women: a voice of encouragement, a voice of solidarity and a voice of recognition for all the effort that they have been making for decades.