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In the early 1990s, The politically vulnerable Kashatagh region of the country of Nagorno-Karabagh was devastated during Karabagh’s war for independence. While this region could provide the rest of the struggling country with enormous benefits, including three new routes for international trade and enough agricultural resources to sustain most of the country, it has been steadily bleeding residents since Karabagh’s liberation. Kashatagh needs a growing, thriving population if Karabagh is to survive, but the living conditions in the region are horrible. Many of the current resettlers are living in bombed-out ruins—entire families living in one or two rooms with makeshift roofs, earthen floors, and leaky walls and ceilings. Many children in the region resent their conditions and blame their parents for choosing to live there. Newly married couples stay away, not wanting to start families in open rubble. Of the 24,000 resettlers who have moved to the region since the war, only 8,000 remain. The number-one reason they cite for leaving has been lack of housing. Building new homes is exceedingly expensive, but last year the Tufenkian Foundation began testing out an alternative. The Foundation ran a successful pilot project in 2008 that has renovated ten existing houses, turning them from ruined shelters into homes worthy of dignified living. After training local brigades of young men to perform the renovations, the Foundation supervised and inspected the work. The residents of each home also participated, keeping costs down and engendering a sense of ownership over the project. The projects proved that there is a cost-effective way to meet the biggest need of Karabagh’s most important (and most impoverished) district. Now, the Tufenkian Foundation is expanding the scope of the project: their new goal is to fully renovate the 1300 neediest war-ravaged homes in Kashatagh, helping the district build new life and new hope. The Tufenkian Foundation’s Kashatagh Home Renovation Program is part of a larger slate of projects that foster resettlement in Karabagh’s strategic borderlands. These include programs aimed at bolstering infrastructure, job creation, health care, and education. For more information on the full range of the Foundation’s work, or to find out how to contribute to this ambitious project, please visit TufenkianFoundation.org.
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