This story was originally published by Global Press Journal. Global Press Journal is an award-winning international news publication with more than 40 independent news bureaus across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
For almost a decade, Cornelius Letkeman Banman has produced cotton in El Oasis, a desert-like town in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, where the climate is perfect for growing one of the country’s most economically significant crops—in fact conditions are so ideal, the state has become the country’s leading producer.
In 2013, Letkeman moved his family of six to this rural Mennonite farming community in the Ojinaga municipality, where he could focus on planting cotton, which doesn’t require as much water as other crops he used to grow, such as corn, beans and alfalfa. The Mennonites have historically moved continually to avoid religious persecution. Letkeman’s community in Chihuahua can be traced back to Switzerland in the 16th century when members of the Swiss Anabaptist movement followed the teachings of former Catholic priest Menno Simons. They fled through Europe and into southern Russia, with many eventually landing in the Mexican border state of Chihuahua in the early 20th century.
