About Etta Projects

Mission - Etta Projects empowers Bolivian families to transcend poverty through education, economic opportunities, and a supportive community for impoverished women while meeting the basic nutritional, learning, and health needs of their children.

Vision - Etta Projects envisions a world free of hunger, poverty, illiteracy and inequality.

Etta Projects is dedicated to the memory of Etta Turner, who, at the time of her death at sixteen, left a legacy of inspiration and caring that spanned three continents. At her home in Port Orchard, Washington, her incisive sarcasm, her whimsical wit and her genuine joie de vivre led a generation of her peers to cast off convention, be themselves and be happy. During her travels with her family in Kenya, she was ever waylaid to share a smile, a touch and a conversation with whomever she chanced across. As a Rotary exchange student in Bolivia, even while homesick and frustrated, she impressed everyone with her undaunted approach to life — gentle and attentive, irreverent and enthusiastic.

Etta Projects strives to serve those most drastically affected by poverty. We believe that our energy and resources are best used to provide the most impoverished Bolivian children with nutritious meals, and to offer nutrition, hygiene, and economic development classes for their mothers, allowing families to realize immediate, drastic improvement to their situation.

As mothers see their children receive nutritious meals each day at Comedor de Niños Etta Turner, their minds and energy are freed to begin to take the necessary steps out of poverty. As each child's health improves, a mother's hope grows, allowing her to believe her family's life can be better and that she has the power to attain that goal. We then provide mothers with economic training, work possibilities and access to micro finance programs.

In June of 2003, the Comedor de Niños Etta Turner was opened in Montero, Bolivia, where Etta lived. The Comedor is located in La Floresta neighborhood which is one of the poorest in the city of Montero. Etta Projects totally funds the daily operations of the Comedor.

In July 2005 we opened Etta II located in Pampa de la Madre, a much more rural section of Montero. Here disease and poverty are even more acute and Etta II is one of the first humanitarian aid projects in this area. We are proud to announce that we have turned this site over to local Bolivian control as of April 2008 and will complete our work in this community with a sanitation and water project.

The Comedors presently service approximately one hundred twenty families, with meals going to two hundred children, ages 5 to 12. Each family was interviewed and each home visited. The children receive parasite analysis and treatment ongoing. They receive daily vitamins and iron pills for anemia and are regularly monitored as to their physical health and development. At present the children receive the main meal of the day at the Comedor. After school programs for tutoring are available at each site. The mothers attend workshops, learning how to prepare balanced meals on a limited budget and learn about nutrition, hygiene and sanitation and preventative health. They also have several workshops available to them that teach a marketable skill. The women have access to money management education, advocacy, and small business training so that they may start their own small enterprises.