CBS News: Raising hope, with Peanuts, in Haiti

Adremene Gracia, however, is the exception. In a country with more than 60 percent unemployment, she has a full-time job. Gracia makes something called Nourimanba, a peanut-based malnutrition cure.

Not only does her work help save starving children, it allows her to support two of her own.

"Just having a stable job is wonderful, for the money and to be able to send my kids to school," she said through a translator, in her native Creole.

When CBS News visited the Nourimanba project 18 months ago (see video at left), the facility where Gracia and about 20 other women worked was incredibly basic; everything -- from sorting and roasting, to grinding and jarring -- was done by hand, in a stuffy, windowless room.
But this summer, the doors opened on a brand new, state-of-the-industry processing plant. The facility includes automated machinery, clean rooms, and a lab to test quality control.

More importantly, the plant meets international food processing standards -- a first for Haiti's central plateau.

"Haiti, after the earthquake, has been one negative story after the next, and now we have a very positive story coming out of a region of Haiti that has lacked economic opportunity for centuries," said Jon Lascher, who manages this project for the non-profit Partners in Health.

PIH is the largest non-governmental healthcare provider in Haiti. Last year, its facilities treated 2.8 million patients nationwide. Four years ago, PIH teamed up with Chicago-based healthcare company Abbott Laboratories, bringing private sector knowledge to what had already been a successful, public-sector program.

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