The impacts of climate disasters like Hurricane Mitch in 1998 and Stan Storm in 2005 have seriously affected the crops of these rural producers, and this is why they started mobilizing to demand governmental aid. So far, they have completely failed.

On Friday, the movement of communities affected by floods organized a march to the Presidential Building, to demand the building of retaining walls that prevent Lempa River to overflow. Lempa is the most important river of the country and the centre of the economy of the population in Bajo Lempa.

According to several Salvadoran newspapers, the demonstrators couldn´t achieve the main goal of the measure, which was to give President Antonio Saca a document with requests. Saca will leave office in three months.

On the contrary, the building was surrounded by police officers who didn´t allow the peasants to enter, and who were not willing to think on solutions for the problems of the rural producers.

Sad and tired faces. These were the words used by CoLatino Newspaper when describing Friday´s demonstration. “Little or nothing has been done in all this time”, stated some of the demonstrators to the newspaper.

The serious situation of loss of crops, especially during winter, has a long history. At least ten years, state the communities, many of them made up by former soldiers -from the guerrilla and form the army- who participated in El Salvador latest civil war, ended in 1992.

The lack of answers is worrying the people involved. CESTA-Friends of the Earth El Salvador, organization that is collaborating with the affected groups, stated that the lack of responses by the Exevutive Branch is risking crops and the lives of thousands of people.