Week 4 Febuary 18th-24th 2007
Sendas
Feb 20th
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Demian Ortiz Maciel (the man with the camara) and Helio M. Garcia Campos. |
For the past week, Katie and I have been tagging along with two incredibly dynamic men, Helio M. Garcia Campos and Demian Ortiz Maciel. Helio, President of the non-profit organization, SENDAS, graciously invited us to come along and film as they attended community meetings, toured project sites, and collected footage for their documentary. Demian, an anthropologist and filmmaker, is a member of Colectivo Chiku Tun, a group of former university students who are working with the Piedra Labrada Community in the Sierra Santa Marta to create an ecomuseum.
SENDAS is an organization that creates pathways into ways of life that are more autonomous and sustainable. Helio has been working with this organization on a variety of projects for several years. Everywhere we go with Helio, he is recognized by people in the community and is well-respected for the work he has done to bring environmental and social sciences together in order to create solutions to current environmental challenges. As a biologist, Helio knows a great deal about deforestation, its causes, and possible solutions to reverse this trend. He is also a great proponent of education and works with people to help them take care of their natural environment.
Over the past week, Helio and Demian have attended numerous community meetings, interviewed countless individuals on the work they are doing to conserve their environment, taken tours through the jungle with Popoluca campesinos to film the work their are doing to reforest their jungle lands, helped facilitate a workshop on radio broadcasting in a rural community, filmed former jungle land that has been burned to make space for cattle grazing, and collected footage of ancient cak tree forests in protected reserves. Yes, this is all in ONE WEEK! The film Helio and Demian are making is going to be about 30 minutes in length and will feature work people are doing in the southern coastal regions of Veracruz.
Colectivo Chiku Tun´s project is focused near an archeological site and was the idea of the community to gather the ancient artifacts together in one place in order to keep them in a safe and accessible. This differs greatly from the typical idea of a museum in the city in that, the people to whom the artifacts belong would be able to protect and visit them without having to travel long distances to visit a far-away museum. With help from the Anthropology Department at their University, Demian and his group created a proposal to build a museum which features the social and environmental histories of past and present. This concept involves the local community much more than typical ¨expropriation¨ wherein people from outside the community come in and take the artifacts away. This museum will also be used as a school, research center, and ecological center with a small library, photo gallery, and books of interviews in Spanish and the native Popoluca language.
Funds are still needed to help the museum project come to full fruition. If you would like to donate, please contact Demian at demianudo@yahoo.com.mx.
The students who attended the radio workshop are in need of minidisks. Please let me know if you can help by donating some minidisks. I will collect them and send them to SENDAS when I return to the states.
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Part of the cloud forest at Las Canadas |
Las Canadas
Feb 21st
We arrived at Las Canadas today, here is an excerpt from their website, www.bosquedeniebla.com.mx: ¨"Las Cañadas is a 756 acre land trust, home to one of the few remaining cloud forests in the central zone of Veracruz, Mexico. It has been designed with the goal of modeling and sharing alternative methods of food production, responsible travel and sustainable living practices." It is a very interesting and dynamic place.
I tried not to have many expectations before we got there, but its hard not to have a few, but whatever those expectations were they were far exceeded by the place. 14 years ago a man named Ricardo Remero, inherited 300 hectares of the land now know as Las Canadas. When he inherited the place it was a cattle ranch with just a very small clump of the original cloud forest remaining. Ricardo saw some major problems with the cattle industry and what the cows did to the land and he didn't like it. As a result, he sold all of the cattle in hopes of restoring the forest. Since that time, 14 years ago, other people have joined him in forming the vision of Las Canadas and they are now a cooperative. Again the website can explain that vision better than I:
"Our initial intention was to model a successful "green" business. We hoped to demonstrate that one could succeed using conventional business practices such as regular financial growth and increased market share, while respecting and caring for the natural environment. Our work led us to be even more ambitious. We have come to understand that the goal of developing a "green" business or modeling what is sometimes described as "sustainable development" is insufficient. We now recognize the need to identify "sustainable life practices" which go far beyond simply substituting conventional inputs and practices without altering the fundamental orientation of the larger system. We are now attempting to re-design our practical life systems – how to meet our basic needs for food, shelter, the education of our children, and honor our relationship to our local community and the environment. In short, we are re-defining our culture as a whole."
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Kitchen Garden at Las Canadas |
Bath house for the dormatories where people stay when they do courses |
They are fulfilling this mission in many ways. One way, which was the first project, was reforesting 150 hectares with 50,000 native trees. We had the opportunity to walk through three different stages of the cloud forest. The first being forest that had been replanted in the last 14 years. Things grow very fast here, so it looked quite mature. The second type of forest we walked through was forest that was roughly 100 years old and the last was the primary forest that had never been cleared. It was interesting to notice the changes in the vegetation as well as the feeling within each part of the forest. Definitely a special and magical type of forest. It is very wet there so a lot of the forest was covered in moss and a tree was not just a tree it was a place in which 100´s of different types of plants, insects, and funguses could call home.
The main way that Las Canadas supports itself financially (they are financially self-sufficient) is though courses and workshops. These courses and workshops are mostly on Agroecology and some on eco-tourism. This week they have a course on Eco-tourism. There are about 18 people from all over Mexico that want learn more about eco-tourism and to start projects, so they came here. Over the years Las Canadas has made quite a name for itself and many people involved in sustainability know about them, therefore their courses are well attended.
Aside from courses they have many other projects going on like they: take interns (many from all over the world); have about 28 people that work where (6 of whom live there); grow 50% of their food; produce organic cow milk and Yogurt; have demonstrations of animal husbandry; an experimental biointensive garden (based on John Jevons work); have a seed saving program and seed bank; run a community school; have working composting toilets, rain water catchment and biological grey water treatment systems.
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Seed saving room at Las Canadas |
the commnuity school made using a natural building technique called rammed earth |
Unfortunately, we will only be here for tonight and tomorrow, not enough time to get a full understanding of everything that they do here at Las Canadas. My impressions of the place are that they are doing some very important work for their community, for Mexico, and for the rest of the world. Another inspiring place, that helps others get inspired as well.
Red Bioplaneta
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Hector Esquivel |
Feb 22nd
It could have been a scene out of a movie filmed in an eco-conscious tropical paradise. Hector Esquivel, a man who I am honored to call my friend, took us on a walk through his ¨back yard¨ in the jungles of Las Cañadas Bosque de Niebla. We visited the agroecology gardens where all the food produced goes to feed the residents and members of Las Cañadas, and took a walk through the enchanted bungalows that house visitors who come to stay. It was in the bungalows, amidst the dry eco-toilets (composting toilets) and showers whose grey water goes through a biological filtration process, the thick jungle forest, and meandering stream, that we conducted our interview with Hector.
I met Hector over 2 years ago at Michael and Anne Karp´s house (of A World Institute for Sustainable Humanity, AW.I.S.H.). He was on a U.S. tour to promote Red Bioplaneta, a national (MX) network of rural sustainable companies and cooperatives aligned with educational institutions, NGOs, research groups, cooperatives, and individuals committed to promoting ecological, cultural, and social sustainability. This network works with a variety of groups who strive to create a good quality of life for the producers, and social and commercial fairness in the market place. The purpose of Red Bioplaneta is to promote environment-committed community companies whose products are improved and then maintained at a good level of quality, to market these quality products at the local, regional, national, and global levels, and finally to ensure a fair price for the work and attention the producers have given for their efforts.
Hector devotes the majority of his time to traveling to visit the projects incorporated with Bioplaneta. There are something like 70 producers currently in the Bioplaneta Network. There are an astounding variety of companies within the extensive network, and they include projects such as organic agricultural products, specialty commodities like coffee, natural dyes, and shampoos, handicrafts, ecotourism, and consultant groups on rural agroecology. I suggest checking out his website for more information on these groups and to buy some of these products (or get your local natural products markets to support these artisans).... www.bioplaneta.com
Bioplaneta operates on the holistic integration of several factors, most notably sustainable development and cultural equality. Bioplaneta works on the premise that every commercial activity function to promote environmental conservation and or rehabilitation of the natural environment. In the bioplaneta model, the producers are included in direct and equal participation at every level of the process from beginning to end. In addition, a fair price is always sought for the producers of the products, especially some of the communities who are among the most economically marginalized sectors of today’s world populations.
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Hector and Pati choosing some seeds |
In addition to being the personal hero of quite a few people (myself included), Hector is a father, husband, community member of Las Cañadas, teacher and engineer of alternative technologies, yoga and meditation instructor, friend of the sea-turtles (whose eggs and nests he has worked to save for many years), and although he wouldn’t say it, incredible architect! He is building his house at the moment and it is truly one of the most interesting and colorful homes I have ever visited. Thank you again Hector, Pati, and Aisha for inviting us into your home, feeding us really tasty homemade yogurt, and letting us ask question after question about your lives.