Learn More About Honduras

What is the history and culture of Honduras?  Why is it one of the poorest countries in the Americas? Why do tens of thousands of Hondurans risk their lives each year to emigrate illegally to the US?  Many of the clothes we wear, the bananas we eat and the coffee we drink is produced in Honduras.  How much of this money actually ends up in the homes of Hondurans?

Here is a list of web resources that will help you understand gain some understanding of Honduras.  Many thanks to Paul Jeffrey and CCD for putting this together.  If you find additional links, send me an email and I'll add it to this page.

General Information

Immigration

Each year, tens of thousands of Honduras make the dangerous trip to the U.S. to find work and the promise of a better economic future.  These leave behind parents, husbands, wives and children.  Many of them are teenagers. Here is a  Los Angeles Times story about  Enrique, a Central American teenager of migrated illegally to the U.S.  It's one of the best-written and most moving stories I've read in a long time about this enormous tragedy.

Resource Center of the Americas is an up-to-date site providing news and information on issues and actions in Latin America and on immigrants in the U.S.

Development, Fair Trade and Globalization Issues

Honduras is today one of the poorest countries in the Americas.  It produces large quantities of tobacco, pineapple, coffee and bananas.  However, most of the businesses which grow, harvest and export these crops are owned by large multinational corporations, meaning that they are largely owned by citizens of the United States.  Although the low wages paid to Honduran agricultural workers stay within the country, the profits do not.  Honduras is also the home of many "maquila" in which low-wage workers put together clothing for the North American market.  These are similar to the banana and pineapple plantations -- the work is done in Honduras, but the profits generaly flow to foreign owners. 

Honduras also owes billions of dollars to international leading institutions and much of its tax revenues goes to paying the interest on this debt.  All of this creates a very confusing, complex and bleak picture for the economic future of the Honduran people.  Here are a number of web sites which examine some of the causes and some of the solutions to this huge problem. 

Maquilas: Garment Factories

Honduras is a land of tremendous physical variety and beauty, although much of its forests have been destroyed by logging.  It contains a number of national parks filled with birds and other wildlife.

Churches In Honduras