What a week's work pays for

Octavio Paulino works in the fire brigade, mostly on watch duty, and sits on his communal council. He has three children in school. Before Paskaia, he earned money for his family by cutting and selling timber. Now he can earn it helping protect the forest.

During co-design sessions, the Miskito community proposed a rotating brigade so that as many families as possible could share the paid work. The arrangement has since provided work for hundreds of families.

Before, I would take the chainsaw out for weeks at a time. Now a week's work pays enough, for shoes, a notebook, a schoolbag.
Octavio Paulino

Interviewed in 2026 in La Mosquitia. Quotes translated from Spanish.