Good Results: experiences and richness of the peoples
In the Água Boa Community, a premonitory name located in the State of Minas Gerais, in southeastern Brazil, lives Maria Lúcia Agostinho. Known as Dona Lúcia, she is a family farmer, a native of the Cerrado region, an active protector of the Cerrado, and also considers herself a “guardian of the springs.”
Dona Lúcia works to strengthen the supply chain of fruits collected and sold in the area, such as araticum, mangaba, licuri coconut, and especially pequi. In this region, clay crafts are also prominent and a result of learning from ancestors. Pots, filters, pans, and jugs are incorporated into the fruit supply chains, contributing to income generation and local sustainability.
Fruits and plants also come together in the making of this craft. Women make hats from licuri palm straw, baskets from vines, among other things. Furthermore, family farming is strong, especially with cassava, which they use to make starch to be sold. The seedling nursery and heirloom seeds also provide production and income for the Dona Lúcia community.
Dona Lúcia’s territory is constantly threatened by large-scale projects, mainly eucalyptus monocultures. “Many of these entrepreneurs started developing monocultures in nearby regions, which damaged the environment and caused imbalances. “Regions that once had enough water, no longer do.”
The threats to the territory of the Água Boa community impact both the environment and the way of life of the farmers. Dona Lúcia recounts that her community organized mobilizations and demonstrations, and that she herself, along with other comrades, went on a 36-hour hunger and thirst strike to prevent the destruction of water springs by a large development project that also prevented them from accessing water.
All this struggle has borne fruit. Dona Lúcia and her community achieved recognition of their territory as a Sustainable Use Conservation Unit, the Nascentes Geraizeiras Sustainable Development Reserve, in the areas where they collect fruits and raise animals, which gave them greater security. The guardian of the springs continues with her community in the defense of her territory, understood as the defense of life itself.
Located in the Midwest of Brazil and considered the largest quilombola community in the country, the Kalunga territory is inhabited by people who nurture an ancestral relationship with nature, based on respect and sustainability. Women excel in handling local biodiversity, transforming it into handcrafted products with unique characteristics.
There are countless native plants that feed the Kalunga families, but some also generate income for the women, such as the famous pequi and buriti fruits. They still use produce from family farms to increase sales at local markets. These are oils, soaps, flours, spices, handicrafts, among other products, made by these women who always have their doors and wisdom open to anyone who wants to be enchanted by the Kalunga energy.
When visiting the community of Vão de Almas, one of the many communities that make up the Kalunga territory, it is easy to understand why this work is done in a sustainable way. The way of life of the quilombola people ensures the conservation of large areas of native vegetation, where they collect these many fruits and coconuts, amidst their fields of cassava, corn, beans, rice, sesame, and a multitude of other foods.
The way they cultivate the land, store seeds, and make use of native fruits are part of the centuries-old knowledge of this population. If the territory is an extension of the Kalunga people’s bodies, then it is also life for this community.
