Roland Spendlingwimmer

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Roland Spendlingwimmer (* 1946 in Freistadt , Upper Austria ) is an Austrian development worker and refugee worker.

Life

Spendlingwimmer attended elementary school in Neumarkt im Mühlkreis . In 1966 Spendlingwimmer graduated from the Freistadt high school and began studying agriculture at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna a year later. However, he broke off his studies 4 years later and took over the management of the self-managed youth center "Heliopolis" in Vienna.

Years of preparation followed for the establishment of European pioneer settlements in regions that were severely affected by the emigration of the agricultural population. In the summer of 1972 the first project was set up in southern France, and the European cooperative Longo maï was founded together with young Swiss, British, French, Germans and Austrians . Until 1974, the expansion of the Longo maï infrastructure, agricultural development work and sheep breeding were promoted. In 1974, seven foreign founding members of Longo maï were expelled from France by the French government . Further branches in Switzerland , Germany and Austria followed .

In 1978 local government officials were invited to Bangladesh and Djibouti with the aim of founding Longo-maï-like cooperatives there. In the course of the war against the Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua , Roland Spendlingwimmer was invited the following year to set up a cooperative especially for refugee families from Nicaragua. For this purpose, a piece of land was bought in Costa Rica near San Isidro de El General , which has since been known as Finca Sonador . About 50 families began to cultivate it. That is why Spendlingwimmer has been working in Costa Rica since 1980, supported by his wife Claudine and supported by the Austrian Foreign Service .

At the beginning of the 1980s the conflict in El Salvador was at its height, and many families fled to Costa Rica to settle there at Finca Sonador. The majority of these families remained in Costa Rica after the peace negotiations in 1997, and in 2001 the community already comprised 65 families (approx. 360 people).

In addition to the refugee cooperative, Spendlingwimmer oversees various eco and social projects, including the UNAPROA environmental initiative and, previously, the preventive association Vida Nueva ( New Life ) for children, young people and women in socially difficult situations who should be offered educational opportunities. Around 2010, Vida Nueva ran into trouble and was eventually discontinued.

Recognitions

Individual evidence

  1. Hoamat. Memories of Roland Spendlingwimmer ( Memento from February 3, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) San Isidro, September 18, 2010