"With few job opportunities and food harvests hit by climate change, more young Guatemalans are leaving poor farming communities in search of a better life in the United States".

"HUEHUETENANGO, Guatemala – After weeks of sleepless nights, Guatemalan farmer Lorenza Mendoza heard the words she had prayed for when a people smuggler called to say 'Your son is ok. He made it.'

About six months ago, Mendoza's 22-year-old son left his remote village in Guatemala's eastern Chiquimula province for the United States in search of a better life.

"When he left, I couldn't eat or sleep. I cried in silence," said Mendoza, at her small mountaintop coffee and bean farm.

The Mendozas sold a plot of land to pay a smuggler, or coyote, 110,000 quetzels ($14,000) to take their son north."

Anastasia Moloney reports for the Thomson Reuters Foundation November 06, 2023. [2]