Young EcoLeaders of the Brazilian Rainforest

Dear donors, 

First of all, we hope you are doing well, and want to send you a big thank you for supporting our program! 

And now for something completely different. This week we want to bring you the inside story of an environmental leader.

My name is Lara, and I'm from the state of Minas, but the other side of the state. Around 800 km from Iracambi. My dad has a farm so I'm familiar with rural life, although as I grew up I started to have my own ideas and we didn't always agree. But I guess that's only natural! 

I decided to study biology, and after my undergraduate work I just kept studying. Couldn't get enough of it. And now I'm working on my doctorate. In fact right now I'm on a sandwich course in Germany. 

I study termites. How they compete and how they collaborate with one another.

A couple of months ago one of my friends introduced me to the Environmental Leaders course at Iracambi and I decided to sign up.

And I can honestly say that it changed my life. I completely fell in love with the approach. Working with other environmentalists, all of whom were determined to make a difference. My group tackled the question of mining and mining reclamation - which is a hot topic in a state whose name means General Mines.

We discussed the impact of mining on soils and water and how we could involve the communities most impacted to take action. We talked about phytoremediation - using plants and associated microbiota to absorb pollution from soils, water and even the air. And we drew up a plan of action.  

We talked about how to involve the community - using science to raise conscience . (It works better in Portuguese, but you see what I mean!)

After the course I spent a week at  Iracambi and was enchanted to meet such a great group of people who really walk the walk. I feel like I found my tribe.

I'll be back. You can be sure of that!  

Dear wonderful donors, 

While politicians, leaders, and representatives of every nation and every sector of society are gathered in Glasgow for COP 26, we have been once again gathering our own groups of environmental leaders online to come together, define and seek solutions to pressing environmental problems in their own communities, and act on them.  And we´re happy to be able to bring you another report from the field, letting you know how we are putting your donations to work!

As you will know if you have been following our letters, we've been mobilizing people of all ages from across Brazil, to reflect on what it is to be an environmental leader, and to collaborate on acts of leadership large and small, reporting back, encouraging one another, and recruiting other potential leaders.

We've just finished our fifth course, and each time we learn something new. Our main takeaway is that there's a hunger among environmentalists for finding their tribe, rolling up sleeves, and getting to work. And in this past course there were two main themes that attracted the most attention and action.

The first is some variation on creating community gardens - often located on school grounds - and encouraging parents, children and community members to come together and get their hands into the dirt. There are a variety of activities in connection with this, ranging from collecting food waste from restaurants and coffee bars to make compost, to setting up composting centers, growing and sharing fresh vegetables with vulnerable communities, raising awareness of environmental issues, and investigating the potential of creating additional income streams for those who are interested.

In parallel, one of the other groups completed a mapping exercise of local smallholder farms, held meetings with the farm women, persuaded the local authorities to set up a famers´ market and also commit to buying vegetables for school meals from the local farmers´ group. 

Taken together, these activities are helping farm families to find new markets, providing healthy fresh food to schools  - often located in food "deserts" with little or no access to fresh vegetables, encouraging recycling and composting, and mobilizing neighborhood communities to work together and have fun.

One of the students, Italo, was so excited about his composting project that he couldn´t help talking about it. "I absolutely loved the course,"  he said, "and the best thing was to meet so many interesting people, and to give ourselves time and space to stop and reflect about what we could do together. I got so interested that I started looking into agroecology, and it´s opened up a whole new world for me. My group is figuring out how we can maybe set up neighborhood cooperatives, and the course may be over, but we´re not stopping!" 

So thank you so much, dear donors for your support, and, as we are moving towards the end of the school year, we just wanted to give you a headsup that over the next months we´ll be running a series of courses for people who work with young children on how to introduce them to science through the medium of the arts. And we´re hoping and hoping to be able to bring the local schoolchildren back into the forest when the next school year begins in February. So, we have a busy few months ahead. 

And we may not be at COP 26 but we're doing our bit for the environment!

with love and appreciation from Yasmin and the Iracambi team ,