The U.S.-Honduras Remittance Corridor
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clients and deliver in both ways (mainly by air cargo) documents, letters, photos, videos, medicine, traditional food (nostalgic products), remittances, toys, clothes, household and entertaining utilities, furniture, and so forth. Viajeros charge US$5 per pound for the transport of goods and 4–5 percent for delivery of cash. Their price structure is the same everywhere in Honduras. Each journey to the United States leaves them a net profit of around US$1,000. The BCH estimates that channeling of cash using this informal way amounts to 6 percent of total remittance flows (refer to Chapter 2). The majority of viajeros form a one person, informal business. Many viajeros are experienced migrants who are well connected to transnational networks. Their basic obstacles are noncompliance with quality and safety standards of the exported nostalgic products, visa regulation, lack of financial history, and principally lack of operation as a registered business. Only few decide to register. However, some viajeros are capitalizing upon their entrepreneurship and becoming professionally managed and legally registered international courier businesses. Viajeros are for many migrants an important source of information about products, services, prices, and investment opportunities back home. The comparative advantage of the viajero is credibility within the migrant community because, most often, they come from the same community. Their lucrative job (at least by local standards) is seen by many of their clients more as a favor than a service. Viajeros also exchange project documents of collective remittances between the hometown community and migrant leaders or Honduran Hometown Associations (HTA). Viajeros are an important yet unofficial link between migrant communities and their hometowns in the U.S. Honduran remittance corridor. “In El Salvador, thousands of individuals earn a living in this manner and have even formed an association (National Association of Couriers and Culture) with approximately 5,000 members.”5 More understanding of the magnitude this phenomenon is needed in Honduras in order to make viajeros participants of transnational development initiatives. Export of Nostalgic Products
Migrants in the United States create market demand for nostalgic products from Honduras such as traditional food items and local handicrafts (Box 4.2). Compared to Box 4.2. Export of Casabe-bread to Garífuna Community in the United States Fifteen Garífuna communities in the north coast exclusively organized by women with local Wagabari Distribution and partners in the United States launched a business alliance for trade of nostalgic goods. The exported product is seasoned casabe-bread made out of the traditional staple, the yucca plant. The distribution in the U.S. market is organized through New Horizon Investment Club, a Garífuna entrepreneurship in New York, whose objective is to combine economic performance with social benefits for Garífuna communities in Honduras. This case is an illustrative example of the business potential on a specific transnational bridge approach between 300 producer families in rural Honduras and the migrant market in New York. Its advantage lies in the efficiency of targeting the consumer in the United States where approximately 100,000 Garífuna live and demand casabe. Source: Interview with Wabagari Distribution. For more information see: http://www.newhorizoninvestclub.com/home.
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