Main initiatives in the Central Amazon Biosphere Reserve, Brazil
The Central Amazon Biosphere Reserve is a microcosm of the Amazon’s social, cultural, and ecological diversity, connecting urban, rural, and indigenous areas encompassing a rich mosaic of territories and ecosystems. This is also reflected in the detailed knowledge and techniques applied by local groups in using and managing the area’s biodiversity. Local livelihoods demonstrate the great variety and potential of the Amazonian bioeconomy; they include domestication and cultivation of local species, subsistence and commercial fishing, management and use of forest resources and tourism.
Training of the fire prevention and control brigades
Twenty years ago, slash and burn operations could be used to clear fields without the current risk of spreading vast wildfires through the forests of the Central Amazon, which have now become more vulnerable to fire hazards due to forest degradation, climate change and land use changes. Since then, forest cover has been lost at an average rate of 125 km²/year, while an average of 700 active fires are detected per year.
UNESCO and the Vitória Amazônica Foundation (FVA) received grants from the US Forest Service focusing on partnerships with the private sector to develop and strengthen volunteer brigades in order to prevent and respond to forest fires in the Amazon. As a result, the budget available to implement fire prevention and monitoring strategies in the region was doubled. The project also developed guidelines to enable reserve managers and community members to receive real-time information on active fires in the biosphere reserve.
When you see fire in nature, it doesn't make you afraid, it makes you sad, it fills you with despair to see something you try to protect being destroyed. Many times, it's accidental. If you ask if it's scary, it is. But thanks to God, after the training, I started holding meetings with my community to pass on the knowledge, teach them what to do, create firebreaks to prevent the fire from spreading into the forest
Supporting traditional weavers and fiber crafts: Artisan Association of Novo Airão
UNESCO is supporting the efforts of the Vitória Amazônica Foundation (FVA) and its Fibrarte Project, which helped women weavers of plant fibres organize formally as the Artisan Association of Novo Airão (AANA), founded in 1996. Members of AANA include city dwellers and traditional riverside communities where the fibres are harvested.
These initiatives aim to reconcile income generation with the management and conservation of species used in handicrafts, such as arumã, lianas (titica, ambé, tucumã, piassava), açaí and bacaba stems. The Amazon Biosphere Reserves Project is supporting FVA’s work to strengthen the value chain of plant fibre crafts. This includes improving the management of the source materials, support for fibre production, and communication and dissemination of the final products.
Production of essential oils by Inatú Amazônia
UNESCO is supporting the efforts of the Instituto de Desenvolvimento Sustentável da Amazônia - IDESAM to boost the activities of Inatú Amazônia, which is a collective brand of local communities that aims to produce and commercialize Amazonian Forest products, mainly copaíba, andiroba, green coffee and breu essential oils, and value the work of the families that live from extractivism. There are at least 2,500 people involved in the initiative, which allows them to market these products oils with greater added value, in larger production batches, and reach the consumer.
The Amazon Biosphere Reserves Project is:
- supporting the production chain of essential oils from breu (Protium sp.) and pau-rosa (A. roseodora) in the Uatumã Sustainable Development Reserve,
- promoting energy efficiency in the vegetable oil mini-mill, and
- promoting the fair-trade commercialization of essential oils.
Products with protected designation of origin
Ovinha and Uarini flours are traditionally produced in the Amazonas and the Middle Solimões regions, in the municipalities of Tefé, Alvarães and Uarini. A protected designation of origin label certifies their unique quality and their characteristics, including the geographical origin, climate, soil, and the methods of production.
UNESCO is supporting the efforts of the Instituto Internacional de Educação do Brasil (IIEB) to strengthen the value chain of Uarini flour, in line with the Central Amazon Biosphere Reserve Action Plan to ensure income generation opportunities without deforestation and in compliance with conservation and sustainable use programmes. The value chain and its actors are being evaluated, as a basis for the development of techniques, information and knowledge that can support decision-making and strategic positioning, to contribute to the economic development of the Lower Juruá and Middle Solimões region.