Category: 2020

PASADENA (PCF)—For decades, Armenian Relief Society Social Services has supported low-income seniors in Pasadena, with a unique capacity to serve clients who are recent immigrants or refugees and may not seek help elsewhere. The ARS Pasadena office is a one-stop center for maintaining independent living, including medical enrollment, nutritional support, needs assessments, case management, and coordination with public benefits, and provides multi-lingual services to clients.

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and Pasadena’s “Safer at Home” order, new needs quickly emerged among ARS’s clients. Living on fixed incomes and at high risk for contracting COVID-19, vulnerable seniors were suddenly unable to shop for groceries, and many were reporting their need for food. The organization’s deep comunity relationships helped the ARS staff quickly assess the extent of this new food insecurity and, with the help of an emergency grant from the Pasadena Community Foundation, launch a new partnership to deliver free groceries to their now home-bound clients.

In mid-March, shortly before the city issued its official “Safer at Home” order, Director of Operations Talar Aintablian had already stopped in-person appointments at the Pasadena ARS Social Services office. She was aware of the significant danger that COVID-19 posed to her senior clients and transitioned to telephone appointments in order to protect them and continue to provide vital services. New and existing clients kept calling, requesting help with public assistance benefits, Section 8 housing renewals, Medi-Cal enrollment, unemployment, stimulus checks, and more.

As the ARS case manager continued to provide assessments and services over the phone, they began to hear pleas for help with food. Seniors themselves, and concerned neighbors and family members, called to ask for help – how could they get food with no money, and no means to leave the house? In addition to referring them to local services, ARS Social Services reached out to its own neighboring organizations, who had formed the Pasadena Armenian Center Covid-19 Emergency Task Force for crisis response.

In collaboration with the Armenian Relief Society Sosse Chapter, the Armenian Cultural Foundation Lernavayr Chapter, Code3Life, St. Sarkis Church, Hamazkayin Shahan Shahnour Chapter, and Homenetmen Azadamard Chapter, ARS is now aiding in a volunteer-run food distribution effort in their community. ARS staff help coordinate requests for food, and volunteers do the shopping, bag assembly, and contact-free drop off. Food deliveries started on April 7th, and 52 households of older adults ages 65-95 have already received full bags of groceries. Pasadena Community Foundation awarded ARS a $10,000 emergency COVID-19 response grant to cover program costs, including the purchase of food for distribution to their clients.

“As we reviewed how social service organizations across Pasadena were responding to the pandemic, the PCF team recognized that ARS had anticipated the need for food among their home-bound senior clients and wanted to extend their services to meet it,” said Jennifer DeVoll, PCF President and CEO. “By leveraging their existing relationships with clients and community partners, ARS was able to organize an efficient and collaborative community-based response that PCF is proud to support.”

Expansion of Nursery Capacity is Crucial to Meet Armenia’s Goal to Double Its Forest Cover by 2050

BY JASON SOHIGIAN

A major topic of discussion at “Forest Summit: Global Action and Armenia,” held in October and co-hosted by Armenia Tree Project and American University of Armenia Acopian Center for the Environment, was Armenia’s goal to double its forest cover by 2050. This ambitious goal was announced as part of Armenia’s commitment to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.

Various estimates were cited during the Forest Summit about the land area and number of seedlings needed to double the forest cover to 20 percent of Armenia’s territory. It is estimated that more than 500 million seedlings will be needed over the next 30 years, in addition to allowing some forested areas to recover through natural regeneration. With numbers so large, the availability of tree seedlings and nursery capacity is a topic of great interest, so one of the panels addressed “Nurseries and Commercial Forestry: Prospects in Armenia.”

Ruben Petrosyan, advisor to the Ministry of Environment’s Forest Committee, explained that Hayantar has one greenhouse and three nurseries under cultivation, which have a total of 800,000 to one million seedlings under cultivation. Overall, it was acknowledged that the current nursery capacity is inadequate to achieve Armenia’s goals, and that partnerships will be critical to the success of the reforestation effort.

Hasmik Khurshudyan of the National Agrarian University emphasized the importance of seedling quality to ensure the highest long-term survival rates, and having an adequate variety of tree species available to avoid planting monoculture forests that lack the resilience and biodiversity needed for a healthy ecosystem. Not all seedlings are suitable for all regions, especially for high mountainous zones, so she highlighted the importance of finding new sources of seeds in Armenia’s native forests. Samvel Tamoyan, a PhD candidate at the National Agrarian University, recommended that nurseries should be small and decentralized, in order to provide seedlings that are adapted to local conditions.

Finally, ATP’s Operations Manager Arthur Harutyunyan shared insights from the organization’s work over the past 25 years. Regarding the issue of nursery capacity, Harutyunyan pointed out that ATP has established four greenhouses and four nurseries in Armenia. Two are located in Central Armenia, one is in the north in Lori, and the fourth is south in Vayots Dzor. The locations were chosen to be near the areas where the trees would be planted, to ensure the highest survival rates. ATP currently has four million seedlings under cultivation, of which one million will be planted in the near future. He also indicated that ATP has ambitious plans for expansion, especially with greenhouse production of seedlings planted in containers.

Other speakers in this panel were Anahit Ghukasyan, director of the Institute of Botany at the National Academy of Sciences, and Ruben Khachatryan, founder of the Foundation for the Preservation of Wildlife and Cultural Assets (FPWC).

The controversial idea to importing millions of pine seedlings has been under discussion in Armenia, since the number of available seedlings is insufficient. In response, ATP published a position paper in January with several recommendations. These included a strong argument against importing and planting non-native seedlings, a recommendation to plant mixed species forests in order to allow a more healthy forest to evolve, and alternative ways of reforesting that don’t solely rely upon container plantings.

In addition to expanding nursery capacity, training specialists was a major theme that came up in this panel. In response, ATP and the National Agrarian University announced a new partnership this year to address this capacity building issue. Students at the university will conduct internships and field research at ATP’s nurseries and greenhouses. A pilot program is being supported by UNDP Armenia.

“The Forest Summit panelists agreed that development of additional nurseries is key to the success of Armenia’s 30-year reforestation program,” noted Executive Director Jeanmarie Papelian. “The current nurseries operated by Hayantar, ATP, and FPWC can’t produce enough seedlings. However, Armenia must first determine how much land is available to plant and where it is located, so we know how many seedlings are needed and which varieties of trees are best suited for the local ecosystem.”

“At present, Armenia does not have a sufficient quantity of high quality seedlings, nor is an acceptable variety available,” added Ms. Papelian. “Armenia also has only one small seed bank, so in some years there are no seeds available for certain species. Therefore, we need a new national seed bank and seed testing laboratories, since healthier seeds will produce healthier trees.”

YEREVAN (Creative Armenia)—Creative Armenia today announced a special edition of its creative challenge series, in partnership with Ucom, which will award a $2,000 top prize to the filmmaker, musician, writer, or artist who can capture the idea of “self-quarantine” in a single artwork. The work, to be titled “Self-Quarantine,” must be created in the place of the artist’s self-quarantine and submitted by May 15.

The challenge welcomes original and unpublished artworks across all fields. To participate, artists can submit a single photograph, a page of creative writing, an illustration, a short film or song (no longer than three minutes), or any other short-form creative work. There are no limitations regarding the style and genre of work. The only condition is to develop the artwork from the place of self-isolation.

The Self-Quarantine creative challenge is open to everyone. Applicants should submit their work via the application portal on the official website and fill in a short application form. The deadline for submission is 11:59 p.m. on May 15, Armenia time. Learn more about the Self-Quarantine creative challenge and apply online.

The Self-Quarantine creative challenge is launched in partnership with Creative Armenia’s communications partner Ucom.